Questions and answers

We offer a multitude of services such as Qualtrics, physical testing spaces, hardware (e.g., EMG, eye-tracking), software (e.g., LifeData, E-prime), and training services to meet your research needs! 

• To learn more about the INSPIRE services such as Qualtrics, software, and training services we offer, please visit Resources.
• To explore the large selection of physical testing spaces and equipment that INSPIRE offers please visit the Discover the lab page.

• We recommend that you read the guideline papers for the measure(s) of your choice during the design stage and BEFORE data collection: Guidelines Papers - Society for Psychophysiological Research. Do not trust published articles for having implemented good practices! 

• Watch the Mindware videos on data collection (prior to meeting an INSPIRE RA for a live demonstration): MindWare Technologies LTD and X for eye-tracking.
• Use E-Prime, Experiment Builder or similar to send a signal from the computer for stimuli presentation to the computer for psychophysiological data recording. This reduces risks of experimenter error and potentially problematic time lags.
• Pilot your study with a small subset of participants (e.g., N = 5) and fully analyze that data to verify all works as it should (e.g., Are the right stimuli presented at the right time? Is randomization working? Are you recording responses and reaction time? Is psychophysiological data clean? How will it be analyzed concretely?).
• Monitor your data quality during data collection and if possible, preprocess and analyze data on a regular basis to promptly correct issues as they arise.  

1. The most important of these factors is your participant. A few tips here: 

   • Make sure they are comfortable and able to focus on your task (e.g., offer the time to go to the washroom, make sure they are comfortably seated).  

   • Send information ahead of time (e.g., any preparatory tips, including type of clothes to wear, if applicable).
   • Plan enough time at the beginning of the experiment to build rapport with the participant and allow them to habituate to the experimental context (e.g., around 15 minutes).  
   • Try to find optimal times for scheduling the testing session or instruct the participant to select the optimal time for them. Aim for maximum energy and minimum stress for the participant.
   • If you notice a lot of noise in your data, stop the experiment and check in with your participant. There is likely a reason that can be quickly addressed - including going to the washroom, drinking a sip of water, scratching that itch, moving a little to reenergize, and simply forgetting to minimize movements.
   • Plan your experiment to be able to offer breaks regularly to your participants (e.g., every 10 minutes). During the break, participants can move!  
2. Ambient electrical noise (e.g., from lights or computer screens). If you use the INSPIRE facilities, this should already minimized.
3. Electrode freshness. Disposable electrodes have an expiry date, and they should be used promptly after a bag is opened. If possible, plan your study to use all electrodes in a bag within a relatively short period of time.  
4. Non disposable equipment should be well cared for, including cleaning and minimizing risks of physical damage.
5. Ultimately, data must also be acquired appropriately. Make sure to have the right acquisition parameters in BioLab (or other), save the parameters and upload these prior to each session.  

INSPIRE staff will ask about your needs at the planning stage. If you foresee needing more material, email us as soon as possible. 

No one and no place is immune to technological failure. The best plan is to act proactively rather than retroactively. Plan enough time to prepare the sessions to ensure that all equipment works as it should (e.g., at least 15 minutes of your scheduled time). Check in with the INSPIRE RA if you encounter any issues. Note that RAs usually start at 9am. Additionally, monitor data quality throughout data collection.  

The short answer is “maybe”. It is possible that you will have to exclude part or all of the data from a participant. If salvaged, the noisy data may reduce power to detect an effect. Best practice is to reduce noise as much as possible during data collection. The rule of thumb is to exclude participants if you need to exclude or estimate more than 10% of the data (but this depends on the population). You may also need a minimum number of trials. A good strategy is to include more trials than necessary. See Q1 for some tips about maximizing data quality.  

This depends on your experiment and requires careful consideration. A few general principles: 

• You may want to add baseline or control tasks throughout the experiment or at the beginning and end. In some cases, the baseline or control task should be close to the period of interest. 

• The baseline may need to have a comparable duration to the task (e.g., if you analyze data by chunks of 5 minutes, possibly have a 5 minutes baseline).  
• The baseline or control task may need to be in the same physical position than the task of interest (seating or standing up).  
• Make sure the participant is relaxed when you record the baseline or control task.

Consult the guideline below. INSPIRE RAs can meet with you too. Forewarned is forearmed:  

• Some researchers are surprised that there is no single good way to preprocess and analyze data, and multiple measures from each technique can be useful. Multiple factors influence the decision process, including characteristics of your data, your research question, and field of research.  

• It is best to learn how to clean data early. Learning how to clean data during the piloting phase will help to: 1) identify problems in your task or data, 2) identify the right parameters for your analyses, 3) properly recognize noise in your data and assess their influence throughout data collection.
• Make sure to document your preprocessing steps and any information that may help reviewers assess the quality of your data and the rigour of your approach (e.g., % estimated data, % of excluded data and reasons for exclusion, any validity checks like respiratory rate for RSA).
• The person cleaning the data may need to be blind to group (e.g., clinical group vs. comparison group).  

Before the semester

The ISPR opens to participants a week after classes have started. It is not possible to log into your participant account until the system has opened as your account is not yet active.

During the semester

All accounts are created about a week prior to the opening of the ISPR (but not activated until the opening day). As such, if you registered for your course anytime close to the first day of class, or during the semester, your account may not have been created. If you do not have an account, please reach out to our team so that we can create and activate your account.

When looking at your ISPR user account page, the line called “Course(s) “ (under “Phone” and above “Points Earned”) indicates the course(s) to which your ISPR account is linked. Please make sure that these reflect courses to which you are still registered. Dropping a course will not remove these from your ISPR account, so you need to remove them yourself by selecting “modify” and removing the course(s) to which you are not registered. Similarly, if you don’t see your ISPR course, you need to add it by clicking “modify” and adding your course. Failing to do so may result in not obtaining your ISPR points.

When looking at your ISPR user account page, if you scroll down, you can see all the studies to which you are registered (or have completed). The column named “Course” indicates the course to which your point is assigned. Note that this can only be seen if you completed the study and obtained your point. If you are signed up to two different courses, you can choose/modify the course to which the point is assigned by clicking on “reassign”. If you are only registered to one course participating in ISPR, you cannot do this and your points will all automatically be assigned to this course.

You may earn a total of 4 credits per course in which you are enrolled. Studies and surveys lasting under 30 minutes award 0.5 credit, and those lasting between 30-60 minutes are worth 1 credit.

The time it takes for you to obtain your points after having participated can vary. Some studies are set up so that you automatically get your point after you finish the study, while others require that the researcher manually gives you your points. As such, it can take up to a few days for you to receive your points.

If you receive an error message indicating that your ISPR account cannot be found, it is likely that it does not exist and needs to be created. In this case, please email us using your uOttawa email, and provide us with your full name, your student number, the course code(s) for which you need an ISPR account (including the letter at the end, e.g., PSY1102F) and the name(s) of the professor(s).

The prescreen questionnaire is mandatory as this questionnaire determines your eligibility to some of the studies in our system. As such, filling out this prescreen is mandatory as it determines the studies that you will see when you log in. That said, if there are specific questions within the prescreen questionnaire that you
would prefer not to answer, you will have the option of selecting the “I prefer not to answer” option for that specific question. Alternatively, if you do not want to participate in research, please email us to inquire about the film alternatives to research.

Some new studies may appear on ISPR throughout the semester, so keeping an eye out for new studies is recommended. Otherwise, we offer an alternative to research studies for students who do not wish to participate in research. This consists of watching related questionnaire. These films are not available on the ISPR. Please email us for more details on accessing these films.

You may take part in alternative film activities to earn your ISPR credits. You will have the option of viewing one or more films or podcasts on topics relevant to psychology in the language of your choice (English or French) and answering questions about them. If you are interested in completing these research alternatives, please email us.

The protection of all research participants’ rights, including confidentiality, is of paramount importance in research and we take all necessary precautions to ensure a positive and safe experience for everyone who participates in research. The procedures of the ISPR were developed in compliance with the Tri-Council Policy Statement on Research with Humans and the ISPR’s procedures have been reviewed by the University of Ottawa Research Ethics Board (REB). Each individual study that recruits participants from the ISPR system has been independently approved to be in compliance with ethics policies by the REB. Names and all other identifying information will always be treated as confidential and will never be released without explicit permission from each participant.

Everyone is welcome to sign up to the ISPR community pool to participate in research. The community pool portal offers a variety of interesting research opportunities available for participation. For more information visit our pages I am a community member and ISPR Community Pool.

Individual’s of all ages are invited to register to the Community Pool. Individuals under the age of 16 are encouraged to have parental consent before registering. Additionally, parents can register their children to the Community Pool through their own account. If you would like to have your children added to your account, please email us.

ISPR Community members can participate in a variety of interesting research opportunities all year round! 

Some studies can be completed online in a few minutes while others may be conducted in-person, and some may use a combination of both. In-person studies may be conducted at the University of Ottawa, or at other sites around the Ottawa city center. Most studies consist of only a single session, but some studies may have multiple sessions spaced out over longer periods of time.