___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Dot Estimation Task ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ last updated: 02-22-2022 by K. Borchert (katjab@millisecond.com) for Millisecond Software, LLC Script Copyright © 02-22-2022 Millisecond Software ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ BACKGROUND INFO ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ This script implements a Dot Estimation Task, a quick task to manipulate 'Group Membership' by arbitrarily assigning participants to one of two groups seemingly based on their performance on this task. Reference: Mussweiler, T., Gabriel, S., & Bodenhausen, G.V. (2000). Shifting Social Identities as a Strategy for Deflecting Threatening Social Comparisons. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 79, 398-409. ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ TASK DESCRIPTION ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Participants view several slides that contain a varying number of dots for 1000s (not enough time to count all the dots) and are subsequently asked to estimate the number of dots. Based on their preassigned groups, they are told at the end that they are either "underestimators" or "overestimators" regardless of their actual estimation performance. ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ DURATION ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ the default set-up of the script takes appr. 1.5 minutes to complete ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ DATA FILE INFORMATION ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ The default data stored in the data files are: (1) Raw data file: 'dotestimationtask_raw*.iqdat' (a separate file for each participant) build: The specific Inquisit version used (the 'build') that was run computer.platform: the platform the script was run on (win/mac/ios/android) date, time: date and time script was run subject, group: with the current subject/groupnumber session: with the current session id blockcode, blocknum: the name and number of the current block (built-in Inquisit variable) trialcode, trialnum: the name and number of the currently recorded trial (built-in Inquisit variable) Note: trialnum is a built-in Inquisit variable; it counts all trials run; even those that do not store data to the data file. estimatortype: between group condition "Underestimator"/"Overestimator" stimulusitem: the presented Dot image response: the participant's response latency: the response latency (in ms) (2) Summary data file: 'dotestimationtask_summary*.iqdat' (a separate file for each participant) inquisit.version: Inquisit version run computer.platform: the platform the script was run on (win/mac/ios/android) startDate: date script was run startTime: time script was started subjectid: assigned subject id number groupid: assigned group id number sessionid: assigned session id number elapsedTime: time it took to run script (in ms); measured from onset to offset of script completed: 0 = script was not completed (prematurely aborted); 1 = script was completed (all conditions run) estimatortype: between group condition "Underestimator"/"Overestimator" ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ EXPERIMENTAL SET-UP ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ * assigns participants to "overestimator" and "underestimator" condition via groupnumber (odd -> underestimator; even -> overestimator) * presents 11 slides of dots in sequence for 1000ms (default) * presents feedback at the end according to assigned group independent of actual estimation ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ STIMULI ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ see section Editable Stimuli ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ INSTRUCTIONS ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ see section Editable Instructions ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ EDITABLE CODE ___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ check below for (relatively) easily editable parameters, stimuli, instructions etc. Keep in mind that you can use this script as a template and therefore always "mess" with the entire code to further customize your experiment. The parameters you can change are: pretrialpause: Adjustable delay in milliseconds. Change as needed. dotduration: Display duration for the dot patterns in milliseconds.