Download: UML Toolbox (.zip)

Description: Updated Maximum-likelihood Procedure for the Estimation of the Psychometric functions.

Motivation: The estimation of the psychometric function is fundamental to psychophysics. The updated maximum-likelihood (UML) procedure enables efficient data collection for the estimation of the psychometric function by the use of an optimized strategy for stimulus sampling. This UML procedure is is an extension of the traditional maximum-likelihood-based adaptive procedures (Green, 1990) in that multiple parameters of the psychometric functions are estimated simultaneously (Shen and Richards, 2012). This Matlab toolbox enables rapid implementations of the UML procedure. Object-oriented programming in Matlab was used in constructing the tool box, allowing an intuitive organization of the relevant variables and operations

Citation(s):
1. Green, D. M. (1990). “Stimulus selection in adaptive psychophysical procedures,” J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 87, 2662-2674.
2. Shen, Y. and Richards, V. M. (2012). “A maximum-likelihood procedure for estimating psychometric functions: Thresholds, slopes, and lapses of attention,” J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 132, 957-967.
3. Shen, Y., Dai, W., and Richards, V. M.(2014). “A MATLAB toolbox for the efficient estimation of the psychometric function using the updated maximum-likelihood adaptive procedure,” Behav. Res. Methods., 1-14.

Quick-Auditory-Filter (qAF) Toolbox

Download: qAF Toolbox (.zip)

Description: Efficient Estimation of the Auditory-Filter Shape using a Bayesian Adaptive Procedure.

Motivation: One of the fundamental features of the auditory system is its tonotopic organization. The auditory periphery acts as a frequency analyzer, mapping different frequency components of sounds to specific locations along the basilar membrane. Functionally, this process can be modeled as a bank of band-pass filters, namely auditory filters. The shape of the auditory filter, in particular its bandwidth, is highly predictive of perceptual phenomena such as masking.

Citation(s):
1. Shen, Y. and Richards, V. M., (2013). “Bayesian Adaptive Estimation of the auditory filter,” J. Acoust. Soc. Am., 134(2), 1134-1145.
2. Shen, Y., Sivakumar, R., and Richards, V. M. (2014). “Rapid estimation of high-parameter auditory-filter shapes,” J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 136, 1857-1868.

Quick-Auditory-Filter (qAF) Online

Download: qAF Online

Description: Efficient Estimation of the Auditory-Filter Shape using a Bayesian Adaptive Procedure. This web–based application provides an implementation of the quick–auditory–filter (qAF) procedure described by Shen and Richards (2013) and Shen et al. (2014). The qAF procedure was developed to provide efficient estimation of the auditory–filter shape. The auditory–filter shape (See Fig.3a for an example) is defined by three parameters: p (slope of the filter’s tip), 10logw (tip to tail drop), 10logK (detection efficiency). During the experiment, a pure–tone target is detected in a notched–noise masker, while the masker characteristics (i.e. masker level, and lower/upper notch widths) are adaptively manipulated. A typical qAF procedure requires 150 trials, which takes approximately 20 minutes.

Motivation:

Citation(s):
1. Shen, Y. and Richards, V. M., (2013). “Bayesian Adaptive Estimation of the auditory filter,” J. Acoust. Soc. Am., 134(2), 1134-1145.
2. Shen, Y., Sivakumar, R., and Richards, V. M. (2014). “Rapid estimation of high-parameter auditory-filter shapes,” J. Acoust. Soc. Am. 136, 1857-1868.

MCS (Method of Constant Stimuli For Hearing Experiments) Online

Download: MCS Online

Description: Method of Constant Stimuli for Hearing Experiments.

Motivation: This web-based application provides an implementation of the method of constant stimuli for psychophysical experiments that involve the presentations of audio stimuli. The subject performs a 3-alternative, forced-choice task on each experimental trial. The stimuli presented during the signal and no-signal intervals are supplied by the experimenter by uploading customized audio files at the beginning of the experiment.