Psychometric Function of Absolute Hearing Threshold
Psychometric function ‘represents the probability of a certain listener's response as a function of the magnitude of the particular sound characteristic being studied’.
To give an example, this could be the probability curve of the subject detecting a sound being presented as a function of the sound level. When the stimulus is presented to the listener one would expect that the sound would either be audible or inaudible, resulting in a 'doorstep' function. In reality a grey area exists where the listener is uncertain as to whether they have actually heard the sound or not, so their responses are inconsistent, resulting in a psychometric function.
The psychometric function is a sigmoid function which is characterised by being ‘s’ shaped in its graphical representation.
Read more about this topic: Absolute Threshold Of Hearing
Famous quotes containing the words function, absolute, hearing and/or threshold:
“The intension of a proposition comprises whatever the proposition entails: and it includes nothing else.... The connotation or intension of a function comprises all that attribution of this predicate to anything entails as also predicable to that thing.”
—Clarence Lewis (1883–1964)
“If a man needs an elaborate tombstone in order to remain in the memory of his country, it is clear that his living at all was an act of absolute superfluity.”
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)
“People in general are equally horrified at hearing the Christian religion doubted, and at seeing it practised.”
—Samuel Butler (1835–1902)
“Much of modern art is devoted to lowering the threshold of what is terrible. By getting us used to what, formerly, we could not bear to see or hear, because it was too shocking, painful, or embarrassing, art changes morals.”
—Susan Sontag (b. 1933)