title: Accuracy and precision of visual stimulus timing in PsychoPy: no timing errors in standard usage.
abstract: In a recent report published in PLoS ONE, we found that the performance of PsychoPy degraded with very short timing intervals, suggesting that it might not be perfectly suitable for experiments requiring the presentation of very brief stimuli. The present study aims to provide an updated performance assessment for the most recent version of PsychoPy (v1.80) under different hardware/software conditions. Overall, the results show that PsychoPy can achieve high levels of precision and accuracy in the presentation of brief visual stimuli. Although occasional timing errors were found in very demanding benchmarking tests, there is no reason to think that they can pose any problem for standard experiments developed by researchers.
authors.affiliation: Deusto Institute of Technology, DeustoTech, Universidad de Deusto, Bilbao, Spain.
authors.forename: Pablo
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Garaizar
authors.affiliation: Department of Experimental Psychology, University College London, London, United Kingdom; Primary Care and Public Health Sciences, King's College London, London, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: Miguel A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Vadillo
mesh_terms: D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010775:Photic Stimulation / Q000295:instrumentation* / Q000379:methods*; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D012984:Software