I’m very new with Superlab (using it for the first time yesterday) so I do apologize if these questions have been asked before.
I’m building an Implicit Association Test experiment and so far I have encountered a couple of issues:
After the stimulus (pictures or words) lists have been created in Event editor, the words or pictures display in the exact order in the list they came from. Is there a way I can have these stimuli randomized without having to inputting them in random orders?
Participants are required to press a key when a word/picture is shown. If the wrong key is pressed, an X appears beneath the picture/word and the picture/word remains until the right key is pressed. Then the participant can move on to the next stimulus. So far I have been able to get the X to display but when the participant presses the second time, the key is not registered as correct or incorrect. It will only register the 3rd time.
Regarding your first question, in the Block Editor there is a Randomize tab, select Randomize the trials in this block. This will randomize your Stimulus list events.
For your second question, it would be easier to answer if I could see your experiment. Can you please post as an Experiment Package? This is found under the File menu within SuperLab.
Thank you so much for your response. Attached is the experiment as requested. I could not get the stimuli (pictures or words) randomized. Perhaps my question was not clear. Hopefully when you open the experiment, my randomize question would make more sense. I would like the faces and words to be presented randomly to each of the subject when they run the experiment.
Also the feedback issue still needs to be addressed.
Thank you so much for your time. I do appreciate it.
A revision of your experiment is attached. Below are the changes that were made.
For your "Incorrect Feedback" event, under the [B]Input[/B] tab, the setting was changed to "Immediately after the event is presented"
A new event was created to explicitly erase the screen
For your events "Stimulus-Faces" and "Stimulus words" the [B]erase screen before presenting stimulus[/B] option was turned off under [B]Stimulus[/B],[B] Settings[/B] then [B]Presentation Options[/B]
Your instructions were separated into their own block. Randomization was also turned on for "Practice Images 1" and "Practice Words 1"
Thank you so much for the changes. It works beautifully. One more question: The next task is to show subjects 20 pairs of a word and a picture. There are 10 pleasant words, 10 unpleasant words, 10 Hispanic faces, 10 White faces. The pair will either be a pleasant word + a Hispanic face or unpleasant word + White face (each word and picture are used only once). What I am planning to do is to create 20 trials (representing 20 pairs) and 40 events (20 words and 20 pictures). Each trial will be made up of 2 events. This would probably work but I see two disadvantages:
This is a time-consuming approach.
I have to predetermine which word to go with with which face instead of having Superlab randomize (without replacement) for me.
Do you have a suggestion how to tackle these two issues?
As of right now you are going to have to use the pre-determined approach. Regarding it being time consuming, if you take advantage of the Stimulus List function, it will save you a great deal of time.
Sorry to bug you one more time. Actually I don’t need to display a word and a picture at the same time. They will be displayed separately. However, a word must be followed by a picture and vise versa (i.e. no two words or pictures will be displayed consecutively). Could you please let me know how to accomplish this? Also, I would like to randomize the pictures and the words as well.
The best way would be to have one trial linked with your Word Stimulus, Picture Stimulus and an event that is receiving the participant’s input. The first two events (Word Stimulus and Picture Stimulus) should have “end immediately after the event is presented” selected under the Input tab.
You will randomize under the Trial level, “Randomize the events in this trial”. Also, make sure the very bottom selection “Except the last one” is checked.
Thank you for the suggestion. I think I am getting close to what I need except for a couple of hickups:
On the last block, when subject responds with the wrong key, the red X flashes on the screen instead of remaining there until the right key is pressed.
Also on the last block, when the wrong key is pressed for the second stimulus of a pair (the stimuli are not really in pair but as a word is always followed by a picture and vice versa, I think of them as pairs), the event goes back to the first stimulus and subject will have to respond to that stimulus again instead of keeping the second stimulus until the right response is received. I’ve included the experiment here just in case what I’m saying is not very clear. Could you pleas help?
Also, I’ve tried the “end immediately after the event is presented” as you said but it only ran through the two list of stimulus without stopping.
For the “Faces” and “Words” events the “erase screen before presenting stimulus” needs to be checked off. The “erase screen” event needed to be moved towards the end of the other events.
The “Faces” and “Words” events are appearing super-imposed on one another. All you need to do is change the position of these events so they won’t overlap.
Also, both “Faces” and “Words” have feedback. If you want the word and picture to always be presented as a pair then you need to remove the feedback from the face event.
Thank you, Monika. The Faces and the words are indeed superimposed on each other. I think your suggestion is to move the face and/or the picture so they will appear on the screen at the same time and not overlap. However, I do not want the picture and the word to appear on the screen at the same time. Perhaps my insistence on using the term “pair” misled you. The program is supposed to show only one stimulus at a time. If an incorrect response is given, the stimulus remains until the correct response is given in which case the screen will erase then show the next stimulus. I’ve tried to erase the screen by checking “erase screen before presenting stimulus” but the same problems as I mentioned in the last post occurred (i.e. when an incorrect response was given, the red x only flashed and the event went backward). Please take another look and let me know.
I’m really sorry I keep this thread much longer then necessary and take up your and others’ time.
It sounds like you want to repeat a single event, whereas SuperLab can only repeat a single trial. You might need to put the text in one trial and the faces in another trial.
Regarding the last comment you left on my thread, could you please clarify that a bit further? For the last block, I would like to show a word and then a picture and then a word, then a picture etc. If I were to have all the pictures in the same trial and all the words in another trial, would all the pictures be run in a row and then all the words would be run in a row and not alternate? I have 40 pictures and 40 words for the task so if each word or each picture requires a separate events, it would make a very bulky program. This is not what I’m trying to achieve. I feel like what I have and what you have helped me with so far is very close to what I need. Perhaps some tweaking is required.
Is there any way to create a stimulus list with pictures AND words in the same list?
Edit: I now understand what you meant by Superlab not able to repeat a single event. If the subject responds incorrectly, the trial will be presented again, which explains why the previous picture or picture gets displayed again.
So if I have the pictures and words in two separate trials, can i alternate their display as I explained in my last message?
Yes, this is possible but it requires some extra steps. The steps have been demonstrated on the last block of your experiment “Practice Words + Images”.
First, create a code. In your experiment it is named "Last Stimulus Type". This code has two values "Face" and "Word".
The "Faces" and "Word" events were put into their own trial "Practice Images" and "Practice Words"
In the "Faces" event a[B] Feedback[/B] action was added to what you already had. For "Response is correct" the action [B]Change value of code "Last Stimulus Type" to "Face"[/B] was added.
The same type of Feedback was added to "Words" except you use the code value "Word"
In the [B]Trial Editor[/B] for "Practice Images", under the [B]When to Present[/B] tab, an expression was created to read [B]Current Trial's Code "Last Stimulus Type" Is Not Set To "Face"[/B].
The same thing is done under the Trial Editor for "Practice Words" expect you use the code value "Word".
A macro was added to repeat the current block. This macro is set to run [B]After all trials in the block have been presented[/B].
Another macro was added named "Mark all Trials as "Last Stimulus Presented" is Face". Under the [B]Expression Editor[/B], it is set to [B]Number of Trials Presented in This Block[/B] with Subset: [B]Using only the last 1 trials in the block and Trials marked with the code "Last Stimulus Type" is equal to "Face[/B]". For under the [B]If True[/B] tab, [B]"Change value of code "Last Stimulus Type" to "Face"[/B] in all trials in this block.
Thank you so much for your help. I would have been able to get all this to work on my own. There is still one small issue: once all the word and picture stimuli in the last block have been run, the program does not end. Rather, the block is repeated (goes into a loop). I thought maybe this occurred because in Faces and Words Events, the feedback dictates that if the response is correct then the other event is presented. Thus, it’s now going in a circle. I changed a couple of things and also tweaked the trials using trial editor but it did not work. Could you please take another look?
Create another expression for your trials “Practice Images” and “Practice Words”. Under the When to Present tab, add Number of times this trial has been presented is equal to 0 for both trials.