Millisecond Forums

Hi Ivor,

Would it be possible to attach your script to this message thread? That would allow me to see more clearly what you are trying to do and determine whether there is a more efficient way.

Thanks,
Sean

Hey Sean,

Of course it is possible to put the script online. You can find it at www.student.ru.nl/i.grisel/Subconcious Experiment.zip .

A little explanation on the files: I've stripped both files to the bare/bear essentials. This includes two main parts, namely presenting cars and getting a nice timer. Since both took a lot of stimuli to make, I've made three files. The first one is to run the whole experiment, namely Subconcious Experiment.exp. The stimuli file is named Random Car Stimuli.exp. Next to that I've also have a file with the car specifications which is in Auto.exp.
A little bit more explanation is required for the Stimuli file. Since I had three variables which needed to be created random for each participant, that gave me a lot of combinations for cars (10 possible carnumbers, 10 possible colors and 10 possible sets of specifications). To get the random lists, I made 3 item-lists, got to present this list randomly (shown in white and timeout 0)(via a trial and block) and let it put the presented words back in a list.
After that, I hard-scripted every possible combination so I could activate them with a branch command. Don't worry, I didn't type it all: I let my little Python script do it for me ;) So my question about this is, if there's a way to do it in a more flexible way, in which Inquisit generates the random lists and maybe even reduce the hard-scripting?
The second question is a bit of the same: is it possible to make a timer without implementing every possible time?

Thanks a lot for your help!

Ivor

With a little bit of lateral thinking, yes. I've used the <video>
element and the <block> element's '/bgstim' command in the past
to provide participants with continuous information about the elapsed
time across trials. You'd basically have a video or (even better) a
flash file that serves as a digital clock. I can email you these files
as well as an example script if you want.



Regards,

~Dave

I didn't thought about that possibility! It certainly is a more hansome solution in the script. I would really appreciate it if you would sent the files. I'm curious how that will look. Too bad my employer doesn't really care much for the way it is implemented, just how it looks :)
My mailadress is nospam_i.grisel@student.ru.nl (without the nospam_ obviously). Thanks!

Ivor

A flash file! I hadn't thought of this before. Great idea.

-Sean

I came up with this approach back in the good, old Inquisit 2.0 days. We had subjects do a timed writing task and needed to provide them with continuous information about the time they had left to complete their essays. If you have any use for the flash file, just let me know.

Best wishes,
~Dave

Hey Dave,

I checked out the file you sent. I wasn't that impressed with the timer (although the idea of a flash tile or movie is still quite clever ;)), but really with the Tower of Hanoi problem! It looks really great. Hopefully I'll get the chance myself to have to make something like that (but only if my employer wants that of course).

I also hope you could answer my other answer. But take your time, there's no time pressure since the program is working, I'm just curious about a more... 'beautiful' way of programming it.

Kind regards,

Ivor

Hey Ivor,

well, the timer certainly isn't meant to be actually 'impressive' but simplistic and functional. You can do all sorts of things with this approach (including impressive ones!). Just take the general idea and optimize it for your particular needs. Many thanks for the comments on the Tower of Hanoi script (although it's only a rough sketch and I'm not particularly happy with it in its current form). But hey - it does the job. As I already said, I'll look at your other questions whenever I have some time...

Best wishes,
~Dave

Hey Dave,

I know the timer is simplistic and functional. Just one catch: I'm not familiar with flash, so I won't be able to fully integrate the timer into my script. And since we want total control (sounds really bad), I think hard-scripting it is the only method here. And since I do know a little Python, hard-scripting isn't all that bad since Python makes the <item>-element :)

What form would you like the Tower to have? More flashy?

And I'll hear from you soon than, but as mentioned: take your time!