I don't know, but, if it involves programming, it should not be that different from, eg, PEBL, or DMDX. Do you have a copy of the program? I could try studying it briefly to see if there are any simmilitudes.
The program is only licensed to one computer at any one time. You can only ever put it on 2 but you lose the license on the first. I think however I have found a tutorial to help me through although I am still on the basics! I believe it is similar to Visual basic tho. Thanks for offering.
The scripting is an implementation of VBA (Visual Basic for Applications) so references on that should help with scripting. I find the GUI is better supported than the scripting interface, though.
(Have you looked in the Program Files/PST/E-Prime/Documentation folder for the three included manuals? I find that Windows doesn't search those folders if you just ask it if the manual is on your computer. Oh, or you can download them from the PST support area -- you just need the serial number to get a support account.)
No I haven't looked (but I will be doing so). I was wandering around the E-Prime support area yesterday but I think the license restricts what we can and can't access. For instance for help I have to go to my Uni helpdesk but they aren't E-Prime whizzes...I need to access an E-Prime tutor (which I am trying to do). I did find one of the handbooks online though and that talks about a clock face. I tried (and failed) to build the first part yesterday but I will try again! Thanks for replying!
no idea about e-prime, but the positioning of shapes around a circular path is pretty easy. you just need to use some trig. :) assuming you've got N possible positions around the circle, and a command like DrawCircle(x, y, radius), here is some pseudocode:
big_circle_radius = 100; little_circle_radius = 10; for (i = 0; i < N; i++) { if (need_to_draw_circle_at_position(i)) { DrawCircle( big_circle_radius * cos(360 * i / N), big_circle_radius * sin(360 * i / N), little_circle_radius); } }
(note: depending on the sin and cos implementation, you might need to replace 360 with 2*PI.)
I know I wrote something with a circle of stimuli in it back when I was working at CMU, but I can't remember now which one it was... And of course I'm on a Mac at home, so I can't check.
You can look, though, at the things in the "Attention" section of the categorical script list and see if anything fits with what you're trying to do.
I think what you're asking can be done with the VBA scripting functionality, but it's probably easier to just arrange a circle of images on a slide, and have each correspond to an item in a list (which can be an image of any size, or blank for no image).
The attention section certainly has some of the papers that I am studying in it, but I don't believe any of them use the clock lay out which I am trying to achieve. I have managed to use someone else's program and to duplicate her images but I think I need to try to build the experiment in the E-Prime handbook I found and see if the clock face that's mentioned in there produces what I am needing.
Arranging the circles on a slide sounds like it has possibilities. However I will probably have 90 trials which could take ages to produce as I wanted to ensure that the stimuli are presented in different locations and I hoped that E-Prime would make this easy for me. I will keep playing!
I have since found out that the tutors at the Uni will program E-Prime for us, so I guess its just knowing if the program can do what I want. I am thinking about your idea for preparing stimuli in advance (and I may have to do so) but I wanted 90 trials, all of them to be presented differently, so I need to think about how practical that is to produce. I don't know what E Prime is capable of and whether it can move stimuli around to ensure all positions are used once.
You've only described a stimulus, not an experiment. As another poster pointed out, you could make the image you describe as a bmp and E-prime could present it. More importantly, what are you going to do with this image? How many of these clock circle stimuli with three different colors do you need? What will the subject be doing and how will you collect the response (if any)? What analyses will you want to do on the responses afterward? All of these affect how you lay out the E-prime program.
The E-prime manuals and examples are very helpful, but it is NOT an easy programming method to learn from the ground up. But spec'ing it out beforehand so you know exactly what the program should do in all cases will definitely speed things up.
OK...bear in mind I only began the planning for this on Tuesday and this is the first time I have done anything like this. It also may end up totally different or I may take parts out as there are lots of different options / ways to cut corners if its all too much. This is the outline
( ... )
No one can program that up and make it work in one day from scratch (not unless you point a gun at their head). If you had a couple of days or a week, or if they have built something similar before that, sure.
But if you start making bmps right now (can you get a tutor on the phone and ASK them whether they can do this?), then show up with 90 bmps in your various conditions, it is a SNAP to program up something that either steps through the images in order or randomly, shows the image for a fixed amount of time and collects response time and accuracy.
THe thing about you making bmps now is, you've basically substituted yourself for the computer in making the stimuli. :) Sometimes it's easier to program yourself...
I have a tutor helping via e-mail at the minute who has been brilliant - but it looks very much as if I have to make the 90 bmps myself (although that must take ages to prepare 90 slides and 90 fixator slides (all the same obviously) in E-Prime once we get to summer school!! At least I can get 4 slides from one by rotating and flipping slides. But yes I would have liked a computer to randomly do them for me :(
I have just about cracked the clock face design tho. My sister turns out to be an Excel whizz and its all sorted, equidistant etc and it looks great.
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I think however I have found a tutorial to help me through although I am still on the basics! I believe it is similar to Visual basic tho.
Thanks for offering.
Reply
(Have you looked in the Program Files/PST/E-Prime/Documentation folder for the three included manuals? I find that Windows doesn't search those folders if you just ask it if the manual is on your computer. Oh, or you can download them from the PST support area -- you just need the serial number to get a support account.)
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big_circle_radius = 100;
little_circle_radius = 10;
for (i = 0; i < N; i++)
{
if (need_to_draw_circle_at_position(i))
{
DrawCircle(
big_circle_radius * cos(360 * i / N),
big_circle_radius * sin(360 * i / N),
little_circle_radius);
}
}
(note: depending on the sin and cos implementation, you might need to replace 360 with 2*PI.)
Reply
Reply
You can look, though, at the things in the "Attention" section of the categorical script list and see if anything fits with what you're trying to do.
I think what you're asking can be done with the VBA scripting functionality, but it's probably easier to just arrange a circle of images on a slide, and have each correspond to an item in a list (which can be an image of any size, or blank for no image).
Reply
Arranging the circles on a slide sounds like it has possibilities. However I will probably have 90 trials which could take ages to produce as I wanted to ensure that the stimuli are presented in different locations and I hoped that E-Prime would make this easy for me. I will keep playing!
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(The comment has been removed)
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The E-prime manuals and examples are very helpful, but it is NOT an easy programming method to learn from the ground up. But spec'ing it out beforehand so you know exactly what the program should do in all cases will definitely speed things up.
Reply
Reply
But if you start making bmps right now (can you get a tutor on the phone and ASK them whether they can do this?), then show up with 90 bmps in your various conditions, it is a SNAP to program up something that either steps through the images in order or randomly, shows the image for a fixed amount of time and collects response time and accuracy.
THe thing about you making bmps now is, you've basically substituted yourself for the computer in making the stimuli. :) Sometimes it's easier to program yourself...
Reply
I have just about cracked the clock face design tho. My sister turns out to be an Excel whizz and its all sorted, equidistant etc and it looks great.
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