Sections

RiddleMeThis forms are divided into sections. Each section will be shown separately during runtime (as a separate screen when running as a standalone application, as a separate web page when running online).

There are several reasons for breaking up forms into sections:

Usability. It's easier to deal with forms in small, manageable pieces.

Organisation. There may be logical reasons to break up the form so you can keep track of what you're doing.

Progressive Disclosure. You may not want the end user to potentially see a question before answering a different question. Sections let you prevent part of your form from being disclosed before another part is completed.

You can modify several attributes of an individual section.

Section Name. This is present simply for your convenience (telling different sections apart). It does not appear on screen when a form is running.

Password. This allows you to prevent "unauthorised access" to parts of a form. In an online study you may only wish to allow particular people to complete your questionnaire. In a lab study you may want to have an "Office Use Only" section where independent variables are recorded, or block progress beyond a certain point where experimenter intervention is required. Password-protected sections allow you to prevent a form's data from being corrupted.

This is what the password requester looks like at runtime

Note: for password protection to be enabled, you must check the Required button and have matching passwords in the Password and Verify Password fields.

Launch Program. This section will launch the file named in this field. Note that the first file in the questionnaire folder whose name begins with the string provided will be launched (e.g. if you enter "MyScript" in the field and there are five files named "MyScript_1", "MyScript_old", etc. in the folder, it will launch the first one it comes across). This is designed to facilitate cross-platform use, where on a Macintosh an application might be called "Stimulus_A", whereas on a PC it might be called "Stimulus_A.exe", and on the web it might be "Stimulus_A.html". By entering "Stimulus_A" the form will work in all four contexts.

The Launch Program feature supports variable entries. See the section on Conditional Launching for more information.

Conditional Sections

The remainder of the settings determine whether or not the section is included for a particular session. By default, a section will be included (so for many forms you can ignore these settings). If you want to alter the form based on random variables or answers to earlier questions, then you need to change these settings.

Related Topics

Conditional Sections, Randomized Variables