At this point in the course, you should have read a few articles related to your literature review topic. You should be taking notes on the articles you read and be critically examining the empirical

SONA Participant Instructions updated May 2018 1

PSYCHOLOGY PARTICIPANT POOL WEBSITE (SONA)

INSTRUCTIONS FOR STUDENTS (Participants)

What is this research participation stuff ? Students in courses at the University of Texas of the Permian

Basin ( UTPB ) may be required , or have the opportunity , to earn cre dit in their courses by participating in

research . The purpose of this option is to give you firsthand knowledge of psychological and related

experimentation. The main way in which students may fulfill this requirement is to participate in

experiments cond ucted by UTPB faculty and their research assistants. The UTPB Institutional Review

Board (UTPB IRB) is responsible for the review of human subject research and approves experiments

posted on the Psychology subject pool website known as Sona Systems. To par ticipate in these studies,

you will need to create an account on Sona . An account on Sona allow s you to see all the studies that are

currently recruiting partic ipants, learn more about these studies, and sign up for a time -slot to complete

each study . By u sing this system, experimenters will be able to award you credit for participating in their

study and you will be able to assign your credits to the courses of your choosing. Your professors also

will have access to this information to track your progress and include these points in your final grade.

How do I access Sona? Go to the Psychology subject pool website: http://utpb.sona -systems.com/ or you

can access Sona by going to the UTPB Psychology department w ebpage. It is extremely important that

each individual only has 1 participant account. Duplicate participant accounts create problems for the

integrity and quality of research data. Students found to have duplicate participant accounts will be

removed from the system. If you created a SONA account in a prior semester, please use the “forgot

password ” feature to access that account and update your password. You may also email the system

administrator for assistance in retrieving and updating your account inf ormation. Please note that students

may need to reactivate/recreate their participant account each full semester. Students should NOT create a

new account if they are unable to recall their log in information.

If you have NEVER used SONA before you shoul d c lick on the “New Participant?” link on the bottom

left -hand corner of the screen. To c reate your account you will need to (a) p rovide your first and last

name , (b) c reate a unique User ID that you will remember (e.g., lastname_firstinitial) , (c) e nter a n email

address (that you actually use , this is how you will be contacted by the system administrator and

experimenters) , (d) p rovide a telephone number where you can be reached (optional – leave blank if you

do not wish to be contacted by phone) , (e) Sele ct your courses (highlight all of the courses you are

currently enrolled in from the list of courses that are using sona , be careful to check the section numbers

or instructor name where appropriate!) , and (f) c lick on Request Account (this should go throu gh right

away). You will then receive email confirmation from sona -systems (you may need to check junk mail

folders) of your user ID and password (you can change your password once you’ve logged into the

system).

What are S ona credits? Sona credits are a way for you to receive compensation for participating in

studies. Credit is based on 30 minute increments. A typical study lasting up to 30 minutes is worth 0.5

credits , a typical study lasting 60 minutes is worth 1 credit, and so on. It is at each instruc tor’s discretion

to decide how many credits students in their courses are required or eligible to earn, as well as how these

research credits translate into a portion of each student’s grade for the course. Credits do NOT accrue

from one term to another. Credits only count for the current semester. You cannot save up credits from

one semester to use during a subsequent semester. Thus, you will need to complete new research credits

during each semester (e.g., whole summer, summer I/A, summer II/B, fall, fall A, fall B, spring, spring A,

spring B). You can only use each credit once. A credit will not count for more than one class. However,

if you belong to multiple courses, you may reassign a credit from one course to another within a single

semester. To do th is, simply use the Reassign link that appears when you view your progress. The link

appears under the course entry for each item in your progress list. Attempts to reuse credits are considered

academic dishonesty and will be dealt with accordingly. Please allow researchers up to one week SONA Participant Instructions updated May 2018 2

following an appointment to award your credits, or possible no show status. If a credit is still pending

after that time, you may contact the experimenter to ask them about it, or contact the system

administrator. Please in clude your full name, the name of the study, and the date and time that you

participated in your email.

Where do I do these studies? You may be able to complete some studies online (either through Sona

itself or through a link to another website host ing online surveys such as SurveyM onkey or Qualtrics ),

whereas other studies may be face to face in various classrooms and computer labs on the UTPB campus .

With the SONA system, you may view studies and sign up for those that interest you and those for which

you satisfy any special requirements. You may cancel your sign up through the system as well. To view

the list of studies, click on Studies from the top toolbar. You will see a list of studies that includes a brief

description of each study. Studies that c urrently have available participation times (i.e., timeslots) will

have “ TIMESLOTS AVAILABLE ” listed next to their name. To view more information about a study,

click on the name of the study. It is your responsibility not to double book yourself (i.e., si gn up for two

experiments at the same time). Some studies may be online studies that you complete from any computer.

These studies are clearly marked. Other studies are face to face and will list a specific time and location.

Additionally some studies may be two part studies where you must sign up for both parts of the study at

once and the two parts must be scheduled a certain number of days apart. Please read the study

information carefully to be sure that you meet any eligibility requirements. Once you h ave determined

that you meet all requirements, you may sign up for a study.

What happens after I sign up for a study? To sign up for a study, click on View Timeslots for This

Study and you will see a list of available timeslots. Choose a timeslot that is convenient for you and click

not click to begin an online study unless you have the time and intentions to complete the study

right then. You cannot sta rt and stop an online study multiple times. Please note that if a study has

specific timeslots and a room number, then the study is face to face. You must arrive at the

designated room on time in order to be able to participate in that study and earn credi t. After you

the study you plan to participate in. Depending on how you configured your SONA participant account,

you may also receive email confirm ation. Please pay careful attention to the time and date you choose.

When you arrive for a study, please make sure that you are on time and have come to the correct room.

The specific room should be available from your list on the My Schedule and Credits p age. The

experimenter will give you instructions and explain what he/she would like you to do. Feel free to ask

questions about anything you do not understand. Participation is voluntary. If, after hearing the

instructions, you decide that you would rather not participate, politely inform the experimenter and you

may leave. However, you will not receive any credits because you did not actually participate in the

study. If you begin an experiment in good faith and then decide that you prefer not to participa te later on,

you may leave the experiment and may receive partial credit for the portion that you completed. Please

remember that simply deciding to leave the experiment is not a good faith effort. For example, declining

to participate because you did not read the sign up information carefully or you have scheduled another

appointment that conflicts with your research time is not a good faith effort. If you arrive at a study and

an experimenter is more than 5 minutes late and has not called you at least the day before to cancel the

experiment, first double check that you are actually in the right place at the right time before assuming it

is the experimenter’s fault. If the experimenter is at fault, you can claim the credit by sending an email to

the system administrator at [email protected] . The email should identify your name, the name of the

experiment, the location and the time of the appointment. This email should be sent at the time of the

appointment to e stablish that you were present and available. The administrator will investigate and

award you credit if the claim is determined to be valid.

SONA Participant Instructions updated May 2018 3

What if I need to cancel my timeslot? If you need to cancel your participation in a study more than 24

hours bef ore your scheduled participation, you may do so. Go to the My Schedule and Credits Page by

choosing the My Schedule/Credits option from the top toolbar. You will see a list of all the studies you

have completed as well as the ones you have signed up for. C lick the cancel button next to the study that

you have not yet participated in and which you want to cancel. You may receive a warning that your

cancellation might affect your ability to participate in other studies due to prerequisite restrictions. It is

your responsibility to deal with this issue. Usually, this warning requires that you cancel your

participation in the other connected study as well. If you cancel the first part of a two -part study, the

second part will also be canceled. If you cancel the second part of a two -part study, the first part will not

be canceled, but you will need to contact the researcher to see if you are eligible to complete the second

part at an alternate date/time. Some studies may not allow you to do this, but others might. In addition,

cancellation of the second part of a study may result in no credit for the experiment, even if you had

participated in the first part. If you need to cancel your participation in a study when there are less than 24

hours before your scheduled participation, you should contact the researcher directly. Below the

description of each study you will see contact information for the researchers involved with the study.

You should contact the researcher; normally email is preferred, to request a cance llation. Please note that

contacting the experimenter and/or leaving a message for the experimenter is NOT sufficient to cancel the

appointment. The appointment will not be canceled unless the experimenter agrees to do so. If the

experimenter does not agre e to cancel it, you will receive a no show assessment.

What happens if I don’t show up or complete an in -person study? If you fail to keep an appointment

or are more than 5 minutes late to an appointment, you will not earn the credits applicable to that

experiment. In addition, if you earn 2 unexcused no show credits you will be locked out of the SONA

system. You will not be eligible to participate in any research studies, whether face to face or online, for

the remainder of the semester. It is a waste of the researcher’s time to not show up. It also prevents other

participants, who may have shown up, from earning those credits. If you reach the 2 unexcused no show

credit limit you should speak to your instructor about other options to complete the require d or optional

research credits.

When I logged into sona, it told me to take a prescreening, what is that?

The prescreening is a brief questionnaire containing demographic items and other basic information. Your

responses to the prescreening may be used t o determine what studies you can see. This is because some

research studies have specific criteria and we want to make sure that only people who meet that criteria

prescreening responses could be used to make sure that only left -handed people are able to sign up. The

prescreening responses can also be used so that researchers can send you an email to advertise a study that

you may qualify for based on your responses. Only the sona administrator has full access to the

prescreening results. The researchers on sona, may choose criteria for their study based on specific

prescreening responses. Then, they can email you about their study if you meet their eligibi lity criteria.

When can I participate in studies? All SONA participation for the semester MUST be completed the

week before the semester ends . Individual instructors reserve the right to use an earlier deadline for their

student’s participation. Please be aware that in a given semester there is no guarantee that studies will

have available timeslots each day that the participant pool is open.

If you have any questions about creating your account or using the subject pool website, please contact

the system administrator, Dr. Jamie Hughes at [email protected] or by phone at 432 -552 -2347.