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Experiment

An experiment is a procedure carried out to support, refute, or validate a hypothesis. Experimental research measures the effect of a specific factor manipulated by the researcher in a given situation. In most cases, two equal groups are composed, where one is subjected to an experimental factor and the other (the control group) is not. It is important that this occurs in a controlled research environment.

Key components of an experiment are (i) design; (ii) execution, including the important task of careful measuring ; and (iii) statistical analysis of the results (the experiment is a quantitative research strategy).

The tools that can be used to support these tasks are highly dependent on the chosen research design and are, therefore, very diverse. Because measuring plays such an important role in experiments, computers are used whenever possible. Examples of instruments and tools that are used to support experiments in our faculty are:

Survey:	Qualtrics
Usability testing and user experience research:	Morae
Response time measurement:	E-Prime
eye movement measurement:	Eye tracker, e.g. in combination with E-Prime

Some programs are only used to measure data (such as Qualtrics), which must then be subjected to statistical analysis by a different program (such as SPSS). Other programs (such as Morae) also include features for statistical analysis.

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