Objective: P3a and P3b event-related brain potentials (ERPs) were elicited with an auditory 3-stimulus (target, distracter, standard) paradigm in which subjects responded only to the target.
Methods: Distracter stimuli consisted of white noise, novel sounds, or a high frequency tone, with stimulus characteristics perceptually controlled. Task difficulty was varied as easy and hard by changing the pitch difference between the target and standard stimuli.