Recording voice response in a questionnaire file in MediaLab

Hi,

I am having trouble in recording voice responses. Could someone offer my any solutions?

1. I would like to record participant's 3 minute-long response in one item in a questionnaire file in MediaLab v2012. I have followed the instruction on the manual and I have set the file name as a .wav file. I run through the item and spoke something into the microphone. I then found a .wav in the voice files, but it does not really record anything when I played. It seems that the item is only creating a file there for recording so far, but it is not really recording. Can someone help me solve this?

2. I would like to place a countdown timer on the same page with the item of voice response. The way suggested by the manual (d-180) does not show up any countdown timer. From previous posts, I could show the countdown timer through html. However, it says in the manual script that we can not collect data on the item with html. Does anyone have any solutions or ideas?

3. According to the manual, we can change the color of the words in the questionnaire file. However, when followed the manual, I click on edit and preferences on my MediaLab 2012, it only shows up "fonts", but no "colors."
Can anyone help me this as well?

Thank you very much.

Best,
ychang

Hello,

1. It sounds like you are doing things well by following the manual to record your voice responses, so I am wondering if you may be having a mic problem. When you open and play your .wav file, does time elapse but there is no sound? You may need to adjust the sensitivity of your mic (MediaLab\Utilities\SoundCheck). If just a file is being created as a placeholder, but nothing is in the file and no time is passing when you play it, you may not have your mic set up properly. Try doing a recording outside of MediaLab to see if everything is functioning properly.

2. Are you putting your d-180 parameter in the .que file or the .exp file? Using the countdown timer is something that goes with questionnaire files, not the item types, so it will be a parameter in the .exp file. You'll want to have your voice recording questionnaire as a .que file, then use that .que file in an experiment. In the newly created experiment, highlight the row with the voice recording questionnaire, click Details on the right-hand navigation bar, and add the parameter (d-180).

3. I think you might be in the experiment editor, which is why when you select Options you can see many font choices, but no colors. If you're trying to change the overall look of how your questionnaires are presented, open MediaLab and select "Preferences" and then "Edit Preferences." You should now see a tab called "Fonts & Colours." If you want to just change the look of a questionnaire or two, think about using $quickstyle.

Hope this helps. If the sound is still a problem zip a file of your .que and .exp files over and I'll take a look.