What percentage of stimulus presentations must a patient respond to, to identify threshold?

To identify a threshold in an auditory test, it is crucial for a patient to respond to a specific percentage of stimulus presentations, which helps clinicians determine the lowest level at which a sound can be heard. A response rate of 50% indicates that the patient is able to detect the stimulus at least half of the time it is presented, which is typically considered the standard for determining an individual's hearing threshold.

By setting the criterion at 50%, it allows for a reliable estimation of what the patient can actually hear, minimizing both false positives and negatives. If the response rate were lower, such as 25%, it may not accurately reflect the threshold, as it could include variability in responses due to factors other than actual hearing ability. Similarly, a requirement of 100% would be impractical, as it is unlikely that any patient would respond perfectly in repeated tests, especially considering factors such as fatigue, attention, and other individual differences in auditory perception. Thus, the practice of using a 50% response rate is widely accepted in audiology for the determination of hearing thresholds.