Measures maximum chronological relative drawdown in MUSIQ-SPAQ imaging-quality scores. Scores are grouped in temporal order (default 10 segments; equal-time bins when timestamps are known). For segment means qj:
Lower is better, within [0,1], with ε=10−12. Input scores must be finite and nonnegative, with at least two time points and two temporal segments. Improving quality has zero degradation; a decline is penalized. A dip followed by recovery still records drawdown, while signed endpoint change and slope describe recovery separately.
Mean absolute quality is also reported: constant low quality is not high quality. Nonfinite observations are not silently removed to compress time. If FPS is unknown, chronological drift is available but per-second slope is null. This is an official quality metric; it does not measure memory. Backend: quality_drift.