Configs

Configuration files

Config files contain all of the information necessary to run trials and gather data. Configs are in .yaml format. These files should be carefully written before beginning any experiment to ensure the desired stimulus is generated and data are labeled and stored as intended. The name of the config file itself does not require a specific format.

To allow for unique naming and organization, label experiment name and subject ID fields. These are not required fields for performing the experiment, but are highly encouraged.

experiment_name: paper1-buzzing-AH
subject_ID: AH

These fields describe the number of trials in the experiment. n_trial_per_block is the number of trials per block of the experiment. A block is a set of contiguous trials without a break a break. Subjects get a break between blocks. These are both required fields.

n_trials_per_block: 100
n_blocks: 20

The total trials should be the number of trials per block times the number of blocks. This is not a required field.

total_trials: 2000

These "freq" fields describe the frequency range of the stimuli, including the minimum frequency and maximum frequency, both in Hz. The duration field describes the duration of the stimului in seconds. These are not required fields. Default values are set to min_freq = 100, max_freq = 22000, and duration = 0.5. These defaults are defined in the Abstract Stimulus Generation Class.

min_freq: 100
max_freq: 13000
duration: 0.5

For a stimulus type that uses bins, the number of bins are set here. This should be a positive scalar integer.

n_bins: 100

This required parameter gives the stimuli type. The name is the class that defines the stimuli type without "StimulusGeneration".

stimuli_type: UniformPrior

Some stimulus generation methods have other parameters associated with them. For example, the Gaussian Prior stimulus generation method requires an n_bins_filled_mean and n_bins_filled_var property. You can see what extra parameters are required for your method by inspecting the class definition for the method (see "Stimulus Generation" section). If you do not overwrite values in the config, default values are used, which are described in the class definition.

min_bins: 30
max_bins: 30

For an experiment with a target signal (i.e., for pilot subjects) this field describes the full filepath to the target signal audio file.

target_audio_filepath: /home/alec/code/tinnitus-reconstruction/code/experiment/ATA/ATA_Tinnitus_Buzzing_Tone_1sec.wav
bin_target_signal: true

This is the path where the output files are saved. This is not a required field. If it is is unset, it will default to tinnitus-reconstruction/code/experiment/Data.

data_dir: /home/alec/code/tinnitus-reconstruction/code/experiment/Data/data_pilot

This field determines in what form the stimuli are saved. The available options are bins, waveform, or spectrum. If not set, it will default to waveform.

stimuli_save_type: bins

This field indicates whether follow up questions should be asked. If it is unset, it will default to false.

follow_up: true

This field indicates what version of follow up questions to use. If it is unset, it will default to 1. Follow up questions can be found in tinnitus-reconstruction/code/experiment/fixationscreen/FollowUp_vX, where X is the version number.

follow_up_version: 1

This field indicates whether "survey" questinos should be asked in the follow up protocol. Survey questions can be seen in tinnitus-reconstruction/code/experiment/fixationscreen/FollowUP_vX/FollowUp_Q, where X is the version number. These questions ask about the subject's experience during the RC protocol and are usually unnecessary to include.

follow_up_survey: false

To run a threshold determination, loudness matching, or pitch matching experiment, the following two fields are additionally required. They indicate the min and max frequencies of the test tones played during LM, TD, and PM protocols.

min_tone_freq: 500
max_tone_freq: 16000

Note: stimuli_type, n_trials_per_block, and n_blocks have no effect on non-reverse correlation protocols, but are still required to exist in a config file for the protocols to run.