Introduction

In self-paced reading tasks, participants need to press a key to read a sentences word for word. There are different ways this can be implemented (Jegersky, 2013).

In this self-paced reading task, participants see an additional word each time they press a key (in this experiment, we use the N key). At the same time, the already read words are masked. This is a popular method in psycholinguistics

You can add sentences to the table.

See also the Same without masking.

About this implementation

This implementation uses various techniques. The sentences are as whole sentences in the table. The task breaks them apart into words, which then are added one to one to a textvariable (i.e., variables starting with a %).

In this implementation, a textbox is being used. Textboxes are good for rendering longer texts in PsyToolkit experiments. They make sure the text is wrapped appropriately.

The main difference with the other self-paced reading task are only two lines. The textbox now uses courier font (which is a monospace font in which each letter takes the same space). And there is one line that uses the mask instruction to change the letters of the sentence shown so far with, in this case, circles.
This experiment also uses the fillup array funtion. This makes sure that in the end, you have a data file with one row for each trial, and each trial is of the same size. Unused reaction time spots are filled up with -1 numbers. This can be handy when reading in your raw data files into statistical software. Make sure you fill up with at least as many values as the sentence with the maximum number of words.

Run the demo

Click here to run a demo

Data output file

In PsyToolkit, the data output file is simply a textfile. The save line of the PsyToolkit experiment script determines what is being saved in the data output file. Typically, for each experimental trial, you would have exactly one line in your text file, and each number/word on that line gives you the information you need for your data analysis, such as the condition, response speed, and whether an error was made.

Meaning of the columns in the output datafile. You need this information for your data analysis.

Colum Meaning

1

number of words

2

the sentence used

3

the total reaction time (ms) for all words together

4-20

the reaction times for each word separately

PsyToolkit code

Click to expand the PsyToolkit script code (part of zip file below) 
table sent
  "John brought cookies for his mother. His father does not like cookies."
  "Mary cooked dinner for her son and daughter. They like spicy fried beans with sauce."
  "Clara is looking after her pets. She has cats and dogs."
  "Mickey likes to take walks in the forest. Especially when Minnie joins him."
  "Donald and Daisy enjoy bike rides along the beautiful lake in their home town."

task paced
  keys n
  show text "Press the n key to start see the first word." 0 -50
  show text "Then press the n key each time for the following words." 0  50
  readkey 1 9999
  clear -1 -2
  #
  textbox new 0 0 700 400 white black 20 monospace
  textbox 1 lock
  #
  set %%words split @1
  set $l %%words size ## how many words
  set %newword %%words remove first
  set %newsentence %newword
  set $mycounter 1
  set &&reactionTimes clear
  while $mycounter <= $l
    textbox 1 text %newsentence
    readkey 1 9999
    clear -1
    set &&reactionTimes append RT
    set %newword %%words remove first
    set %newsentence mask ●
    set %newsentence %newsentence " " %newword
    set $mycounter increase
  while-end
  textbox 1 clear ## removes textbox
  show text "Well done...just wait until next sentence"
  delay 500
  show text ".  "  0 30
  delay 500
  show text ".. "  0 30
  delay 500
  show text "..."  0 30
  delay 500
  clear screen
  set %sentence @1
  set &&reactionTimes fillup 20 -1
  save $l %sentence &&reactionTimes
  
block test
  tasklist
    paced 5
  end

Download

If you have a PsyToolkit account, you can upload the zipfile directly to your PsyToolkit account. Watch a video on how to do that. If you want to upload the zipfile into your PsyToolkit account, make sure the file is not automatically uncompressed (some browsers, especially Mac Safari, by default uncompress zip files). Read here how to easily deal with this.

Further reading

  • Jegersky, J. (2013). Research Methods in Second Language Psycholinguistics. In Research Methods in Second Language Psycholinguistics by Jegerski, J. & VanPatten, B. Routledge: New York. ISBN: 9780203123430. Link to book overview.