In this category you will find posts that are related to programming and should be interesting for psychologists, cognitive scientists, and neuroscientists. Well, almost every researcher would probably find some of the information useful at some time!
Every research psychologist, cognitive scientist, and neuroscientist, should know how to program.. Knowing how to program and write scripts will make many of a researchers everyday tasks much easier. For instance, instead of going through line after line of raw data you can write a Python script that runs through each cell in each column. Furthermore, you get the possibility to use more advanced, and cutting edge, statistical techniques by using R statistical programming environment.
Another example might be to create experiments using PsychoPy (either by coding using Python or using the drag-and-drop interface) and the cheap and open-source Arduino microcontroller. Also, coding is fun and relaxing!
In this post, I will describe the existing free Python applications and libraries for creating experiments. So far, I have only used PsychoPy, but I plan to test most of them. At least the ones that seem to be still maintained. All applications and libraries are open-source, which makes it possible to download the source […]
Python apps and libraries for creating experiments Read More »
In this tutorial, you will learn how to do reverse scoring in R. Specifically, we will use 1) base R to reverse selected variables (e.g., questionnaire items), and 2) we will use the Psych package. Reverse scoring Many instruments (e.g., questionnaires) contain items phrased so that a strong agreement indicates something negative (e.g., “When there
Reverse Scoring using R Statistical Environment Read More »
I am getting better at writing Python code, and I am starting to feel an itch to extend my toolbox and learn more about programming. Therefore, one step in that direction is to learn a new programming language next year (i.e., 2016). I want to learn a relatively new language, and it should not be
What programming language should I learn? Read More »
PsychoPy This post will describe why I prefer using PsychoPy before other software. When I started getting involved in research (i.e., when doing my Bachelor’s and Masters’s theses), I used the software that was accessible to me. That is, some of the most commonly used software in the department I was studying at. After starting
Free & Useful Software – PsychoPy Read More »
I have created a PsychoPy script for the Sustained Attention to Response Task (SART) and a Vigilance Task. Both of the tasks are very similar. In SART, the task is to press the keyspace as fast and accurately as possible on all targets (digits 1, 2, 4–9) except for one (digit 3). In the Vigilance
Sustained Attention Task in PsychoPy Read More »
This rather long (counting the Python code) tutorial assumes that you are interested in scraping data off the web using Scrapy. It might also be limited to Linux. Installing scrapy Here is how to install a Python package using pip: Note, if you need to you can also use pip to install a specific version
Collecting data with Scrapy Read More »
In this post, we will learn how to reverse scores in Python. Reversing questionnaire scores is easy; this post is concise. Why you Need to Reverse Code We sometimes want to reverse the scoring when working with questionnaires that use a Likert scale (e.g., strongly disagree, disagree, neutral, agree, strongly agree). For instance, in a
Reverse Scoring in Python with Pandas Read More »
Python for Data Analysis I bought the book ‘Python for Data Analysis‘ because I wanted to improve my Python skills. This book review is a summary of my impressions of it.
Python for Data Analysis Review Read More »
How to Install PsychoPy on Linux Mint Installing PsychoPy on Linux Mint was not straight forward. This is a short guide on how to install PsychoPy on Linux Mint Debian edition. After some searching around on forums and such I found a solution and put it together in one place. PsychoPy is an application written
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In this post you will find a Python script for randomizing conditions with constraints (i.e., never 2 consecutive trials of X). This script will in a later post be implemented in a cross-modal oddball task created in Psychopy. I recently started to use Psychopy to build experiments. To build my experiments (mainly oddball tasks) I
Python script for trial randomization Read More »