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Sona researcher accounts are required for any individual that will either be posting a study to the ºÃÉ«ÏÈÉúTV Research Participation Pool or running study sessions via the participant pool. 

If you are a faculty member, you may request a researcher account by sending the following information to cmu-studies@andrew.cmu.edu. 

• Your first and last name
• CMU affiliated email address
• Departmental/Center and School affiliation (e.g., Social and Decision Sciences, Dietrich)

For CMU undergraduate students, graduate students, and post-doctoral scholars requesting an account: You must attend the annual researcher meeting led by the Research Requirement Chair and the Participant Pool Managers. This meeting is typically held right before the start of each fall semester via Zoom. During this meeting, we will go over the participant pool procedures and policies.

If you are unable to attend the meeting, you may complete a brief asynchronous . This training will allow you to confirm that you have completed the required CITI training and understand the participant pool policies and procedures. Once this training is complete, you will receive confirmation that a researcher account has been created for you.

For researchers who are visting ºÃÉ«ÏÈÉúTV from a different institution: a researcher account can only be created for you once you have completed the Visiting Collaborator process. This is important not just for having a CMU Research Participation Pool research account, but also for the purpose of collaborating on any projects where individuals will access the University’s facilities, resources, or intellectual property that are not open or available to the public. Collaborating Visitors may include but are not limited to, a faculty member employed by another academic institution, a student who is enrolled in an academic program at another institution, an unpaid intern, an individual who is employed in industry or the public sector, and in less common circumstances, a self-supported scholar. 

For more information, please contact visitor-support@andrew.cmu.edu.

To post a study to Sona and recieve study approval, both a Primary Investigator (PI) and at least one researcher must be listed on the study posting. The researcher(s) listed should be yourself and anyone else who will be helping with participant recruitment and data collection. Please be aware that only faculty members can be listed as a PI. The PI is the faculty member responsible for overseeing the study, but the PI role alone is not used for day-to-day study management. If a faculty member wants to manage the study themselves, they must be listed as both the PI and a researcher.

Please note: Everyone who accesses the ºÃÉ«ÏÈÉúTV Research Participant Pool must do so using their own researcher account. You may not share login information. This ensures compliance with CMU IRB policy and CMU computing guidelines. 

If you need additional research accounts for other members of your research team, please have each individual follow the above steps.

All studies in the ºÃÉ«ÏÈÉúTV Research Participant Pool require a researcher and PI listed (these may be the same individual, where applicable). The PI listed in Sona must be a CMU faculty member.

To request a PI account, please sending the following information to cmu-studies@andrew.cmu.edu. 

• Your first and last name
• CMU affiliated email address
• Departmental/Center and School affiliation (e.g., Social and Decision Sciences, Dietrich)

If you already have a researcher account, a principal investigator account can be made without resending the above information.

Paid Studies

Any behavioral and decision researcher across CMU may post a paid study. Paid studies may be posted at in point throughout the year. Participants of these studies may include CMU students (graduate or undergrduate) and/or individuals from the public who are residents of the Pittsburgh area. 

Paid studies must be within the realm of behavioral science. 

Acceptable Compensation Amounts

• At minimum, studies must compensate $10 per 1 hour of study participation, in increments of $5 and 30 minutes, rounding up (e.g., a 45-minute study should compensate $10). Studies may compensate participants up to $15 per 1 hour of research. This is a rule of the CMU Participation Pool in order to ensure that each study is fairly advertised against other studies, and is not a policy of the IRB. Even if the IRB approves your compensation, we may ask that you go back and update your protocol to fit our policies. 
• For pre-study surveys/qualification surveys shorter than 10 minutes, compensation may be delayed until the completion of the main study. Please ensure that you specify, in your study posting, that completing the screening survey is necessary to be considered eligible for participation. If a participant does not complete the survey, they will not be able to participate. All screenings 10 minutes and longer must be compensated. 
• For very short online studies (generally 5-minute online surveys), studies may compensate with a random drawing/chance to win a larger sum.

Please note that once your study has recieved approval, you may not change the compensation amount unless you recieve approval from a participant pool manager to do so.

Studies for Course Credit

Researchers from Tepper, Heinz, SDS, and Psychology may post studies to the credit pool. Credit studies may only be posted during the Fall and Spring semesters. Participants in credit studies typically include students whose courses are registered in the CBDR Extra Credit Program (graduate and undergraduate level courses from Tepper, SDS, Heinz and select HCII courses may register to participate) and students who are enrolled in the Psychology Research Requirement (100 or 200 level courses in Psychology or in certain cases, SDS).

Acceptable Compensation Amounts

Compensation must generally fit within the following guidelines:

• 1.0 credit per 1 hour of study participation, in increments of 0.5 credits and 30 minutes, rounding up (e.g., a 45-minute study should compensate 1.0 credit).
• For-credit studies, including short online surveys, must compensate with a minimum of 0.5 credits.
• Researchers, typically, may not offer money for a single one-hour session in addition to credit. 
• Researchers may award a maximum of 2 credits for their study. Given that we want to ensure that students are exposed to a diverse set of studies, you may not post 3-hour studies for 3 credits. 
• Credit must be granted to participants within 48 hours of their participation in your study.

General Compensation Guidelines

Certain study types that involve greater participant involvement or specific demographics (e.g., fMRI studies; 21+ alcohol studies) may compensate at higher rates. However, studies may not attempt to out-compete other studies by compensating higher than standard normal rates. 

You may not change your study's compensation rate unless you receive approval from a participant pool manager and have sent your updated consent form to cmu-studies@andrew.cmu.edu.

Participant statuses on Sona must be updated within 48 hours of the study session. Participants' statuses should not be left in "awaiting action status" for more than 48 hours after the study session has already passed.

Indicating Compensation Type and Amount

Compensation should be clearly indicated in three places in your Sona study listing:

1.  The study title should be designated with "($)" or "(CREDIT)" indicating the type of study (e.g., "($) Negotiation Study").
2. In the compensation (Payment/Credit) field for the study with the specific amount of credits or money. Please also indicate how you will be compensating (e.g., $10 via Venmo or PayPal; Chance to win $50 Amazon.com gift card).
3. In the study description with the specific details of how participants will be compensated.
   1. Include when participants should expect comepnsation (e.g., at the completion of the study session; at the end of data collection)
   2. Include what form compensation will take (i.e. cash, gift card, online payment)
   3. Conditional compensation (such as performance payments): unless a study is fewer than 10 minutes in length and specifically indicates that participants will be compensated solely with a raffle ticket/chance to win, participants should always be compensated for their time. While a participant may recieve additional compensation as part of study design (e.g., additional $0.50 for each correct answer), "losses" for performance should never reduce the total compensation amount to less than the guidelines detailed above. 

Researchers should always document providing compensation to participants, including asking in-lab participants to sign a receipt indicating they have received a specific amount of compensation. This record-keeping may be required for reimbursement/finance office guidelines and is important for de-escalation of compensation concerns. 

Non-compensation Policies

"Ten Minute Rule"

Both researchers and participants have ten minutes to show up for a study before they are considered a no-show.

If a participant does not show up to a study, the participant does not need to be compensated if they do not/cannot participate regardless of whether they let you (the researcher) know in advance. If a participant shows up more than 10 minutes late, you may decline to allow the participant to take part in your study. In this case, the participant should be allowed to leave immediately.

Please also note that, within Sona, researchers have the option to mark participants as “unexcused no-shows” or “excused no-shows.” 

If a research participant does not appear for a study session and gives no indication that they would be unable to make it, check the student as an “unexcused no-show” on the Sona system. You must, however, wait at least 10 minutes after the time of the appointment to determine that the student is an "unexcused no-show.”

Participants have the ability to cancel their study session up to 6pm (Eastern Time) the day before the study is scheduled to take place. If it is after 6pm the day before the scheduled session, the participant may contact you directly explaining that they are unable to attend the study session. If you feel that they have a valid reason for not being able to attend, you have the option to mark participants as “excused no-shows.”

However, researchers are permitted to mark any participant as an “unexcused no-show” if they do not cancel online. 

If you are unsure whether to mark an individual as excused or unexcused, please email cmu-studies@andrew.cmu.edu.

Researcher No-Shows

In the unlikely event that you (the researcher) do not show up for an experiment (or are more than 10 minutes late), the participant receives full compensation. You must contact cmu-studies@andrew.cmu.edu to alert the participant pool managers that you have missed a study session. The participant may also contact the Participant Pool Managers (“PPM”) so it is important that they are made aware of the situation. In the event that the study is for-credit, the PPMs may grant credit. If the study is paid, the PPM will direct the participant to you. If the participant contacts you directly, you should provide a way for the participant to receive compensation (e.g. grant credit or tell them where they may pick up the monetary compensation). 

If you fail to show up for an experiment, it is now your responsibility to make sure that you give the participant compensation. The PPMs will be tracking “Researcher No-Shows”. For your first infraction, you will be reprimanded and your name will be recorded as an “Researcher No-Show.”  The second time you will be required to either attend the next researcher meeting or rewatch the researcher meeting asynchronously before being allowed to run research participants again. After the third infraction, your researcher privileges will be revoked for the semester.

Researcher Study Cancellations

If you have to cancel a session, contact the participant at least 24 hours ahead of time to reschedule. Regardless of how far in advance you cancel, it is your responsibility to make certain that the person has received your message (e.g., if you leave an email message, you must receive a reply in return from the participant, so that you know that the participant has received your message). If you cannot reach the research participant a day ahead of time, you are still obligated to meet that person (or have someone meet the person), explain the situation, and give him/her credit.

1. For Credit studies: If a study cannot be run for any reason and participants were unable to be reached beforehand and show up to the study, participants should be fully compensated. That is, if the study is 1 credit study, they should be compensated 1 credit. If 1/2 credit study, they should be compensated 1/2 credit. (In the rare 2 credit case, I think compensating 1 credit is sufficient.)
2. For paid studies: If a study cannot be run for any reason and participants were unable to be reached beforehand and show up to the study, participants may be compensated a designated "show up" amount. (Generally, this should be around 20% of compensation.) These participants should also be offered the chance to participate in a future run of the study.

Incomplete Studies

If a participant takes part in any way in a study conducted in person, they must be compensated in full unless your consent form and IRB protocol specifies conditions otherwise. For instance, if you have critical attention checks, your consent form would have to include a statement that there may be attention checks, and if a participant fails a number of those, their compensation will be affected.  

If a participant chooses to leave at any time during a study, they must be compensated for the full length of a study. Per CMU IRB guidelines, participants are free to leave at any time. If a participant leaves mid-study, please email cmu-studies@andrew.cmu.edu with details about the situation.

Escalating Concerns

Any participant or researcher concerns about compensation should be emailed to cmu-studies@andrew.cmu.edu. Please include relevant supporting material (e.g., study protocol listing compensation amount and procedure). 

Once you have set up a study listing in Sona, you must submit the study listing for approval by a participant pool manager for the listing to become visible to participants. Before a study is approved, participants will not be able to view or sign up for your study, and the study listing will not be advertised in materials distributed to participants. In addition, studies must be set to Active and have open timeslots posted to be visible to participants and included in outreach materials. All studies posted through Sona must recruit participants for scheduled times or online studies; it cannot be used only as an advertisement board. For instance, your study posting should not include a sign up link to a seperate website such a Calendly. 

Please note that the ºÃÉ«ÏÈÉúTV Research Participant Pool does not approve online paid survey studies. Please consider using other platforms like Prolific or Mturk to run online paid studies. 

A digest of studies is emailed to participants weekly on Saturday mornings, including the names, abstracts, and eligibility requirements of all studies that are currently visible to participants. To have your study included in the digest, please be sure that it is active, approved, and has open timeslots no later than 10:00 am on Saturday morning. No advertisements may be emailed to participants in addition to the Weekly Digest.

For researchers who have used the ºÃÉ«ÏÈÉúTV Research Participant Pool before, a brief overview of the study approval process is: set study to “Active” status, then email cmu-studies@andrew.cmu.edu with the study name and attached PDF copies of the CMU IRB protocol/approval of submission form and the consent form for the study. For researchers posting to the participant pool for the first time, the full process (with tips) is detailed below. 

Please note that information will be saved to Sona for a minimum of three years. Studies that have not posted timeslots in the past three years may be deleted. Additionally, participants who have deleted accounts (including study participation history) may create new accounts after three years. Individual researchers are responsible for maintaining any records required by the IRB or Finance.

For researchers who plan to use the participant pool prescreen for publication purposes, you must have this included in both your IRB protocol and consent form. 

If all steps below are completed, studies are generally approved within 24 weekday hours. Please email any questions to cmu-studies@andrew.cmu.edu.

To submit a study for approval, please complete all of the following steps:

1.  Double-check all key parts of your study listing, including (but not limited to):
   1. Study Name: is it clear and accessible, does it specify the compensation type, and does it advertise the study well?
   2. Abstract: does it briefly describe the study? Note: the abstract is included in the weekly digest email advertisements.
   3. Study Description: does it describe all important things a participant needs to know to participate? Please be as detailed as possible in this section because it is important that participants know what to expect before showing up for your study. For example, removing clothing or headgear, being recorded on audio/video, or being exposed to potential skin irritants are all things that may make a participant uncomfortable, which is why it is important for this information to be available in advance. Additionally, your description should indicate when participants will recieve compensation (e.g. immediately after participation, 24 hours after participation, 48 hours after participation, etc) and in what form (e.g. cash, Venmo, gift card, PayPal, etc.). Basic HTML tags can be used in this section to modify the appearance of the text.
   4. Eligibility Requirements: is it clear who is eligible for your study? This section should align with the eligibility criteria listed in your consent form. You may also use the "View/Modify Restrictions" function to change which participants are able to view your study based on questions included in the prescreen. 
   5. Duration: is the study length accurate and does it encompass ALL time a participant will be required to participate/be present for the study?
   6. Compensation (Payment/Credit): is it clear, accurate, and within the Compensation Guidelines? The study title should include a "($)" or "(CREDIT)" indicating the type of study (e.g., "($) Negotiation Study"). 
   7. IRB Approval Code: the IRB approval code is required for study approval.
   8. Listed Researchers: Are all individuals who will be helping collect data listed under "researchers?"
   9. Debrief: Please be sure that your study include a debrief regradless of whether you are offering paid or credit compensation. For in-person studies, the debrief should be conducted verbally. For online studies, you may debrief participants with a written script at the end of your study. Provide the participant with some insight into the general issues addressed by the experiment. Do so in a way that makes the research seem meaningful and worthwhile. It is more important that participants learn something about research that they can relate to their everyday life (if possible) than all the details of the issues addressed in the particular experiment.  Willingly answer any questions the participant has regarding your study.  Allow ample time for such a debriefing.
   10. Deception: If your study includes any deception, you must reveal this at the end of your study. Your goal is to explain the rationale as to why the deception was needed so that the participant comes to understand your point of view. Perspective-taking is the best way to gain the participant’s trust and confidence to not reveal the deception to others. Your goal is to restore the participant-experimenter relationship and to ensure the participant that deception is rarely employed in experiments at ºÃÉ«ÏÈÉúTV.
2. Switch the study to "Active" status, if not already. (Study Menu > Change Study Information > Basic Information: Active Study?, select Yes and Save Changes)
3. Send an email directly to cmu-studies@andrew.cmu.edu requesting approval or a request directly through the Sona approval system including:
   1. The study name as the subject heading or the first line of the approval request (e.g., "($) Negotiation Study").
   2. Within your message, include the study name, the principal investigator's name, acknowledgement that the study has received IRB approval, and information on any project funding received. Alternatively, you can simply attach a PDF of the current CMU IRB-approval document (the document titled "Certification of Approval" or "Approval of Submission" for exempt review). The full protocol is not necessary.
   3. A PDF or word document copy of the consent form (or verbal script) that participants will sign or agree to. A screenshot of the online consent form is also acceptable.

A notice of study approval will be sent to you via email once the request is reviewed and approved or if there are necessary updates. 

In the Sona System, you will not have access to participants first and last name or email addresses. Each participant is associated with a unique ID that is created by the Sona System. These unique ID codes stay consistent for participants. 

It is your responsibility to ensure that you are asking participants to provide their unique ID code for the purpose of tracking who has attended your study, and being able to accurately update their participation status in the Sona system.

Researchers are prohibited from collecting identifying participant information (i.e. names, emails, phone number or addresses) for use within their active study data. While this information may be collected during the initial consent process, it must be stored separately from all research data to maintain participant anonymity.

All study-related communications, including session scheduling, must be conducted exclusively through the SONA system.

Researchers may invite participants to share their email addresses for recruitment in future studies. However, this requires explicit participant consent for future contact and must be specifically approved by the CMU IRB.

If a participant has any objections to your study, you must inform them that they may leave the study with compensation and that they may also contact the CMU IRB Compliance Office to voice any complaints or concerns. 

If you have any concerns that participants are not following the guidelines set by the ºÃÉ«ÏÈÉúTV Research Participation Pool, please contact cmu-studies@andrew.cmu.edu.

The Research Programs

Each semester, the CBDR and the Psychology Department coordinate a credit participant pool. This for credit pool is made possible by the CBDR Extra Credit Program as well as the Psychology Department Research Requirement. Through these two programs, CMU students in participating classes participate in research studies in exchange for credit in their courses. Details about which studies are most appropriate for the credit pool, how to set up a credit study, and how to register your course for the Research Participation Program and Psychology Research Requirment are below.

Can I offer my study for credit?

One goal of the CBDR Extra Credit Program and the Psychology Research Requirement is to give students an understanding of the research process that informs many of the topics that they discuss in their classes. Therefore, only studies from Tepper, Heinz, Social and Decision Sciences, and Psychology may be offered for credit.

If you are unsure if you may post your study for credit, please email cmu-studies@andrew.cmu.edu.

Debriefing

All studies must include a debrief of some kind. This is especially important for credit studies, as research participation is meant to be an education experience. For in-person for-credit studies, you must orally debrief the participant fully.  This includes explaining the goal of the study and how you will reach that goal. If your study is conducted online, you must still debrief participants. You can do so with a written script at the end of your study. 

Provide the student with some insight into the general issues addressed by the experiment.  Do so in a way that makes the research seem meaningful and worthwhile.  It is more important that participants learn something about research that they can relate to their everyday life (if possible) than all the details of the issues addressed in the particular experiment. Willingly answer any questions the participant has regarding your study. Allow ample time for such a debriefing.

Be straightforward in explaining your study to the participant, keeping our educational objectives in mind.  Use common sense in giving the participant feedback about their performance. Make sure the participant does not leave the experiment feeling badly about their performance. If the research participant has been deceived in any way, you must reveal the nature of that deception and its purpose. 

Some information that you can provide your participants with: 

• The purpose of the study
• The hypothesis
• The predicted findings
• How the knowledge will be used
• How the knowledge can improve people’s lives
• If deception was used.

When is the for-credit participant pool open? 

The for-credit pool opens at the start of each semester. Researchers generally start posting for-credit studies during the first week of the semester. Studies must be closed last day of classes (before finals), and all students must be given credit or marked as a no-show by the end of that day.

How much credit should I give my participants?

Each hour of study participation should be compensated with one credit, in 0.5-credit increments. So, for example, a 30-minute study should be compensated 0.5 credits, and a 45-minute study should be compensated 1 credit. All for-credit studies must compensate a minimum of 0.5 credits. You should not pay participants on top of the credit compensation unless cash bonuses for select participants are necessary for your study design.

How many participants will I get using the for-credit pool?

The number of students that sign up for a study depends on a variety of factors and the number of students in the for-credit pool varies between semesters. Online studies and studies without prescreen restrictions tend to get more participants than in-person studies and studies with prescreen restrictions. Studies that are posted for multiple semesters will often see a decrease in the number of participants, because there is often overlap in the students who are enrolled in participating classes semester to semester. The best way to get as many participants as possible is to post your study early on and to leave it up throughout the semester.

Generally, pilot studies that only need a small number of participants are most likely to reach their participation goals.

In Fall 2024, 13 courses participated in RPP and 558 students were eligible to participate in for-credit studies. 

How do I set up a for-credit study?

The process of setting up a for-credit study is nearly identical to the process of setting up a for-pay study. In Sona, after you click on Add a New Study, find the type of study you want to create and select the bubble for Credit underneath the correct type. Then, when filling out the Basic Study Information, include (CREDIT) before the study title, and in the box next to Credits, specify the number of credits that participants will receive for participating in your study. Fill out the rest of the study information as you otherwise would. 

You can also create a study for which participants choose if they want to be compensated with pay or with credit. One way to do this is to set up two separate studies: one for pay and one for credit. Just make sure that in the section Disqualifiers, you select the other study so that participants may not sign up for both the for-pay and for-credit version. The other option is to make a single study listing for credit or for pay. To do this, set up the study as you would a for-credit study (due to system limitations, you cannot grant credit for Paid studies). In the Basic Study Information, include ($ or CREDIT) before the study title, in the box next to Credits specify the number of credits, and explain in the study description how participants can choose to be compensated with either credit or pay. Then, after each timeslot has passed, log back in to Sona to assign credits. For for-credit participants, select Participated and verify that the number of credits is accurate. For for-pay participants, select Participated, change the number of credits to 0, and in the comments specify how the participant was compensated.

IRB and credit studies

When using the credit pool, IRB protocols must include the required information about students participants and credit compensation. Sometimes, non-students participants will sign up for for-credit studies knowing that they will not be compensated with money. In your IRB protocol, please make sure that you also list that non-CMU students may participate and receive no compensation to cover this group of participants. If you prefer that only CMU students participate in your credit study, you can limit the visibility of your study by adding prescreen restrictions. (When looking at your study page, find the box called Restrictions and click on View/Modify Restrictions).

The participant pool managers do note review study protocols, so it is your responsibility to ensure that your protocol follows the above procedures.

Questions about this that are specific to your study should be directed to the IRB ().

I am an instructor interested in having my course participate in the CBDR Extra Credit Program, how do I do this?

Only courses from CBDR-affiliated departments may offer study participation for credit. Course registration occurs a couple of weeks before classes begin each semester so that everything can be prepared for your students to participate. A link to register courses is sent out to everyone on the CBDR email list. Please email the lab manager at cbdr@andrew.cmu.edu for more information about registering your course for the Extra Credit Program.