Group Means and Intersubject and Intrasubject Variability Estimates for Absolute and Relative (Categorical) Loudness Judgments of Typical Young Adult Listeners

Purpose: This brief research note is motivated by an ever-increasing need for typical repeated-measures loudness judgments and variability estimates of the kind necessary to conduct evidence-based treatment studies and clinical trials. Method: These judgments and variability data, originally collected but not reported by Formby, Payne, Yang, Wu, and Parton (2017), are presented here for relative (categorical) and absolute loudness judgments for typical young adult listeners with normal auditory function. Results: As shown in this research note, these data may differ appreciably between young and older adult listeners with audiometric pure-tone thresholds within the clinically normal range. Conclusion: In general, these findings highlight the need for good age-based, repeated-measures data for planning and powering evidence-based treatment studies and, specifically, for clinical trials that rely on categorical loudness judgments (i.e., as measured with the Contour Test of loudness; Cox, Alexander, Taylor, & Gray, 1997) as primary and secondary outcome measures.