Millisecond Forums

hi sean
that would be great! the script i'm using is pretty much the template except for some changes in the instructions. thanks again!
hilary

hi dave,
by blocks i meant comparing the congruent and incongruent trials :) and you're right i could probably do it via SPSS but it just seems unnecessary if inquisit has it already calculated. thanks again!
hilary

Hilary,

I'll add that if your script is displaying the average latencies that Dave mentioned to the participants, it would very easy to have those scores recorded to the data file as well. If you attach your script to this thread, I can take a look at doing this. This is probably a good thing to include in our Stroop samples anyway.

-Sean

Hi Hilary,

Since I don't know anything about your particular experimental design and research questions, I can't answer that. However, when dealing with Stroop effects you're usually not looking for differences in average latency between blocks, but rather for differences in average latency between certain types of trials. Subjects are expected to respond slower on trials that require an incongruent response (e.g. GREEN; the required answer being RED) as opposed to trials that require a congruent response (e.g. BLUE; the require answer being BLUE). Figuring out which data you need to compare is up to you, I guess. Once you're clear about that, you may even extend your script to compute and record the required condition means, etc., although it might be easier to do this through a stats package like SPSS.

You're welcome.

~Dave

hi dave,
thanks for the tip, the data made much more sense when opened in an excel file. however, i'm still wondering about the analysis as inquisit does not record (that i see) the avg response latency per block. isn't this what i need to compare between blocks to find the difference and subsequent difference between conditions? i guess i could do it through spss, however it seems silly that the participants see their score but after i don't have access to it for analysis. any thoughts? thanks again for all your help :)
hilary

I suggest you open the *.dat file with Microsoft Excel or any other spreadsheet application (e.g. OpenOffice Calc). Do *not* try to make sense of datafiles when viewing them in a text editor, the formatting will be all messed up. Once you've done so, it will be much clearer which value belongs to which column -- and I doubt that there'll be empty headers in the file. Finally, to make sense of what the various variables mean, you may refer to the documentation on Inquisit's default data recording scheme.

Best wishes from a fellow Inquisit user,

~Dave