All students enrolled in Psychology 201 and 202, and in Linguistics 290 and 396 and sometimes other specified courses (e.g., Linguistics 100, Psychology 303), are required to have some experience with empirical research. One of the best ways to gain experience is to be directly involved in on-going research investigations. If you agree to serve as a research participant, this document will describe your responsibilities for satisfying the research participation requirement and describe the procedures that you will need to follow.
Your participation serves five important functions. First, most of what you learn in your psychology and linguistics classes is based on carefully conducted research with human participants. Research can seem rather mysterious in the abstract. Participation in research studies gives you a first-hand look at the research enterprise that uncovers the explanations for human behavior. Second, you learn about and are exposed to a variety of different kinds of research methods and different areas within psychology and linguistics. Methodology can range from survey, to measuring physiology, watching videos, responding to computer stimuli to interacting with others. This can help you obtain a better idea of the type of psychology or linguistics research you will be interested in pursing in the future. Third, you contribute to the knowledge base. Just as students in earlier generations contributed to the information in your text books, you also will be "paying it forward" by contributing to the knowledge base of generations that follow you. Fourth, you will become a better consumer of research literature. The first-hand experience with research will empower you to ask critical questions about results, generalizations and methodology based on psychological research. Finally, you may find the experiments enjoyable and/or interesting. This will have inherent value in enhancing what you are learning in your classes. Some comments from student participants about the studies are:
"The debriefing was great. In one study I was given a burned CD with my fMRI on it."
"A lot of them were really fun, especially the "game"-like ones."
"I learned some different ways of thinking in the debriefing, things that I had never thought of on my own."
Other benefits of participating in research are often mentioned in the consent forms of individual experiments, which you will discover when you participate. You will use the following web site to sign up to participate in experiments.
Educational Experience: Research participation should be a valuable educational experience for you. As a research participant, you can usually expect to be given a complete explanation (the "debriefing") at the end of each study (either immediately, or by email). The purpose of the debriefing is to provide you with information to help you understand more completely the purpose of the study and its potential impact.
Obtaining Research credits: Research credits are gained by participation in research projects. Each 30 minutes or less of participation = 1/2 research credit. One research credit is awarded for 31-60 minutes of participation, 1 1/2 research credits for 61-90 minutes and so on.
Research credits Required: Psychology 201 and 202, and Linguistics 290 and 396 require 4.5 research credits of participation. For other classes check your syllabus. If you are in more than one class, you must do research credits for each class (you cannot double-count credits). E.g., students in Psy 201 and 202 must do 9 research credits of participation. You also cannot double-count credits for classes that offer extra credit for participation.
Penalties: If it turns out that you cannot participate in a study for whatever reason, it is your responsibility to cancel your participation by 6 PM the night before the study. In the event that you do not show up to the published location for a study, cancel after 6 PM the night before, or arrive after the study's published "start time," you will be given a penalty. A penalty means that you in effect lose 50% of the study's potential credit, and you do not get credit for participating. For example, if you no-show to a 1 hour study, you will receive a 1/2 research credit penalty, increasing the requirement to a total of 5 research credits.
Research Participation Reports: Psychology 201 and 202 require that students complete reports about their research experience. See your syllabus for details as this varies from class to class. Usually the reports are completed on the class blackboard site, and count as part of your "class participation" grade.
Right to Decline Research Participation Option: If you do not wish to fulfill your requirement through participation in experiments, the course instructor will provide you with an alternative assignment. The alternate assignment for all psychology and some linguistics classes is reading 4 empirical research papers and writing a 4-to-5 page APA style paper about the research. This should take you about as long as the process for attending studies (around 6.5 hours, including research reports), and will be graded on the same scale. Linguistics students may attend Linguistics colloquia as an alternative. Talk to your instructor by the third week of the term if you would like to pursue the alternate assignment option. See your syllabus for additional information as well.
Failing to Obtain Enough Research credits: When you agree to be a research participant, you must complete enough experiments to accumulate the required number of research credits for your course. If a student does not complete the required number of research credits by the end of the term, it is the Psychology Department's policy to give the student an "Incomplete" for the course. The "Incomplete" will remain on the record until the required research is complete, though it is important to remember that the University automatically converts every Incomplete grade into an F after one year! Upon completing the research, the Incomplete grade will be converted into the appropriate letter grade, as determined by your instructor.
In order to make up these research credits, within a year, (1) reactivate your old account in sona; (2) you will be asked to select a class, so choose "make up from former terms." (3) Go ahead and make up the credits; (4) when you are done email csalmon@uoregon.edu and inform that person that you have completed your course requirements for XXX class, from XXX term with XXX instructor. The undergraduate secretary will then contact the instructor and your grade will be put through the registrars office.
Last Day to Obtain Research credits: The last day to obtain research participation research credits is the last day of actual classes for the term. Your instructor may give you an extension into Finals Week, but is not required to do so. Try not to procrastinate! Every study available has to have a researcher able to run the study, and so popular timeslots fill up fast, while other timeslots go completely unfilled. There are often more studies available at the beginning of the term than the end, so if you wait too long you may not be able to earn any research credit at all.
You are responsible for:
On the Subject Pool website (uopsych.sona-systems.com), click on the "New Participant - Request an account here" link.
Name: Please enter your first and last name as it appears on your student ID.
User-ID: This will be your login name for this system. Use whatever you like, as long as it is something you will remember. It is fine to use a name that you might use in an internet chat room or something else anonymous.
Email Address: Ideally you will enter a uoregon.edu email address. If you are using a non-UO email address, please be sure your internet service provider allows emails from this system. Hotmail often "junk mails" messages from the system, and this does not excuse you from missing them. Enter the full exchange: yourname@uoregon.edu or the email address will not register.
Student ID #: Please enter your student ID number NOT your SSN. Your Student ID number is printed on your Student ID card.
Course #: You will need your course number and instructor's name. Select your course from the pull-down menu. If your course is not listed, please contact an administrator. If you are in more than one course, use the control or apple key to select more than one line.
The system will assign you a password and send it to the email address you enter. You can change your password after you first logon.
If you are unable to create an account or you do NOT receive a password, please drop by the Psychology Department front office or email hscoord (at) uoregon.edu to get help with your account.
When you log into sona the first time a prescreening survey will be made available on the system. All students will be prompted to complete this survey. You are not required to complete this on-line questionnaire, but if you do you will get 1/2 research credit and will be eligible for more studies than if you do not complete it. Your responses to this survey are completely confidential. In addition, you will have the option to decline to answer any particular question. The purpose of this survey is to get information from students so researchers can directly contact participants who "qualify" for a specific study. Because some studies need certain kinds of participants, this allows researchrs to know who qualifies.
The on-line forms you complete are meant to be "screening" questionnaires that researchers will use to recruit eligible participants with selected characteristics, which vary from study to study. The only way to participate in to these experiments is to be selected from the prescreening survey. If you qualify for a particular experiment, the individual researcher may call or email you to schedule research appointments for which you will receive research credit. Additionally, some researchers use sona to filter you into studies so you will only see the study on the list of experiments if you are eligible. If you see password protected studies, these too require the prescreen. You may be contacted by a researcher if you are eligible.
There are two ways to sign up for experiments.
You should NOT sign up for an experiment for which you are not eligible (e.g., male signing up for an experiment requiring all females). If you sign up for a study that you are not eligible for, you will NOT receive research credit and you will may receive a penalty for doing this.
If a study requires a password then that experiment is restricted to those who qualify based on responses to the Prescreen. Individual experimenters may contact eligible participants to give them a password so they can use the password to sign up for the study. Do not share your password with other students please as they may not be eligible for the study. If you share your password with a friend, and your friend is not eligible and receives a penalty, that's not very nice!
Bring the Experiment Information with you! It is your responsibility to write down and keep the following information about EACH of YOUR appointments:
NOTE: Be sure to check your e-mail before the experiment--if the researcher cancels they must send you an e-mail by 9 PM the day before the scheduled experiment.
Show up on time: You must show up on time. Plan in advance -- give yourself enough time to get to the experiment at the time listed on the sign up page. If you are late, your appointment may be recorded as a "NO SHOW" and you will receive a penalty of 50% of whatever that study's research credit award is (i.e., you will have to do additional studies to make up the penalty). See below for what to do if the experimenter is not present.
If you are late, the experimenter may still be willing to run you, however, starting at the time you arrive, so it is still often worth it to show up even if you are running late. Don't give up!Experimenter Not Present: If you arrive at a research appointment and the experimenter is not present, first check to make sure you are in the right place! Double check that you wrote down the correct day, time, and place. WAIT for at least 10 minutes. The experimenter may be finishing up with another participant. If the experimenter does not arrive within 10 minutes, you are free to leave. Please report the experimenter "no show" TO THE EXPERIMENTER as soon as possible. The experimenter may have already made arrangements for you to receive 50% research credit because of his or her absence. Please check to see if the experimenter has contacted you and/or given you research credit. If not, contact the human subjects coordinator for help at hscoord@uoregon.edu. You will receive 50% of the value of the study research credit for an experimenter "no show".
If the experimenter is late, the study officially "starts" at the time you showed up, so if the study runs over the expected amount of time, be sure to inform the researcher of this fact.Right to Refuse Participation in an Experiment: Participation in ANY study is voluntary. When you arrive, you will complete an informed consent form that includes a brief description of the project. At that time, or at any time during the experiment, you have the option of withdrawing without penalty. Sometimes it is necessary to withhold some information about the purpose of the experiment until your participation is complete.
Act Responsibly: Finally, be conscientious in performing your tasks in each study. The research is very important to the students and faculty conducting it, and your role is critical to the success of their efforts. Psychology as a science could not exist without the careful and responsible efforts of research participants. Give each study the effort and attention it deserves. Distractions such as text messages or cellphone calls may disqualify you from completing a study!
Online studies: Some studies take place entirely online. This means that you will sign up in the same way as any other study, but that SONA will provide you with a link to a web survey which you can complete at your leisure. This web survey will a same consent form as described above, which you may read before choosing to participate in the study. This consent form will contain contact information for the researcher, so you may ask any questions about the study before you consent, just as in offline studies. Some web studies have a "time-out" period which you will be made aware of. If you are multitasking or do not pay sufficient attention to the study, your study may "time out," causing you to have to begin anew. Similarly, the amount of credit you receive for completing an online survey is based on the amount of time the survey should take if you provide the survey with your undivided attention. The survey may take longer if you are multitasking! Finally, SONA publishes a date by which the study must be completed. This date is shown on SONA when you sign up for an online study. If you do not complete the online study by that date, you may be assessed a penalty.
Online studies also have debriefings, which will be in a printable or savable format. This is like the paper copy of a debriefing that you would be handed in the lab, and it is your responsibility to retain this debriefing if you want it in the future.
Cancel deadline for participants: 6 p.m. the day BEFORE the study
To Cancel an Appointment: If you must cancel, use the "Cancel" option on the sona website. To do this, login to your account and go to "My schedule/research credits." You will see a cancel option. Make sure you confirm the cancellation! (Sona will ask you to do this).
Cancel deadline for researchers: 9 p.m. the day before the study. Make sure you check your email before you go to bed or first thing in the morning before you go to the study. You will not get research credit if you appear for a study that has been cancelled by the researcher by 9 p.m. the evening prior.
It is YOUR RESPONSIBILTY to cancel if you cannot attend a study. If you do not follow proper cancellation procedures, you will receive a penalty.
If you need to cancel after the 6 p.m. deadline, you must contact the researcher directly. You can obtain contact information by accessing the study information in sona. Researchers may allow late cancellations, but are not required to. The researcher may also ask you to reschedule.
If you are making up an Incomplete from the previous quarter reactivate your old account. Do NOT create a new one. When selecting a course, do NOT select the course you are making up (e.g., Psych 201) as that course is for the current term only! Rather, select the course called "make up from former terms." When you are done making up the required research credit hours, contact the human subjects coordinator who will verify for your instructor that it is now OK to put your earned grade through to the registrar.
Complaints & Questions about an Experiment: If you have any complaints or questions about an experiment, please first contact the Principal Investigator (PI) directly. You can find the name of the PI from either the consent form, the debriefing form, or by going to the experiment description in sona. (Access it through my schedule/research credits and click on the name of the study). If you are not satisfied with the PI's response, you can contact the human subjects coordinator hscoord@uoregon.edu, or the Office for the Protection of Human Subjects khomo@orc.uoregon.edu.
Human Subjects Committee Approval: Any experiment in which you participate will have already been approved by the Internal Review board. This insures that someone other than the experimenter has determined that the procedures for a study follow strict ethical guidelines. Any risks must be revealed to you prior to your consent to participate. Despite these safeguards, there are still wide variations in people's reactions to the different kinds of tasks they are asked to perform in research studies. If you feel that you have been mistreated by the experimenter or asked to perform tasks that make you uncomfortable, remember that you have the right to leave any experiment at any time. If you leave an experiment before completing it, you will still receive research credit for the amount of your participation time, rounded up to the nearest half hour.