[open] Trouble Randomizing Questions in a Loop

ramses

Hi everyone, I am trying to create an experiment where I want to randomize the order in which participants receive the questions in my experimental loop. I am using Form Text Input because I found that other similar inputs create a huge lag in my 12 question loop. I change sequential to random but for an unknown reason it always runs it as sequential. I have tried reading through multiple threads but have not found any answers as to what could be happening. This is what my script looks like:

set repeat "1"
set description "Repeatedly runs another item"
set skip "0"
set item "Questions"
set break_if "never"
set column_order ""
set cycles "1"
set order "random"
run Questions

I only want my participants to see each problem once and go through the cycle once. I just need them to be presented in random order so as to remove external confounds from the experiment (e.g. fatigue, practice, etc...)

Thank you for your help!

sebastiaan

Hi,

It would be helpful if you post some more information about the structure of your experiment, including a screenshot of the overview area. But for now a quick guess: Did you put all your questions into one long sequence? A sequence is always executed sequentially, as the name suggests.

Cheers,
Sebastiaan

ramses

Hi Sebastian,

Yes, it appears I have done just that (made my experiment in a sequence). I just recently taught myself how to use OpenSesame so I apologize for my lack of knowledge. Here is a screen shot. Please let me know how I should set up my experiment to have these questions randomized.

I greatly appreciate your help.

sebastiaan

Hi,

The best way to do this is to define your question as a variable (my_question) in a loop:

Then you use only a single form_text_input, and use the variable my_question to indicate the specific question:

Does that make sense? Making clever use of variables can avoid a lot of duplication, and generally make things easier. I uploaded a basic example experiment here:

• http://pastebin.com/Z8RaYGsx

Cheers,
Sebastiaan