13 Mar 2020
 Apps, TIIM Tutorials
March 13, 2020 The BMS lab

Setting up a study

Welcome to TIIM!

Quick guide:

The Incredible Intervention Machine (TIIM) can be used TIIM to collect information on your study’s participants through their smartphone via the TIIM application.

Step 1. Start a new study: your research

  1. Go to https://dashboard.tech4people-apps.bms.utwente.nl 
  2. Login with your account 
  3. On the right side of the dashboard page, click “Start a new study” 
  4. Click on the button “TIIM survey”
  5. Click on “Create new study”
  6. Fill in the study title and description
  7. Optional: select an image
  8. Edit the start and end date and time of your study   
    Note: The start date is the time that Interventions will become available to the participants. The end date is when the study will end and participants will not be able to access the modules.
  9. Optional: Select color of your study
  10. Optional: tick “Use biometric data collection (Google Fit & Health Kit)”
    Note: If ticked and if the participant allows the collection of biometric data in the TIIM application settings, TIIM will collect body measurements such as sleep, steps, and heart rate.

All the information on the “Study Details” tab can be changed later on.

Step 2. Create modules: a set of questions within your research

  1. On the left menu, click on the tab named “Modules”
  2. On the right side, give your new module a unique name (only visible to the researcher) and a title and description (visible to the participants)
  3. Optional: select an image
  4. Optional: add a progress bar
    Note: If ticked, the participant will be able to see how far along they are in answering the questions.
  5. Optional: set a reminder if the participant doesn’t answer the module after a certain period of time
  6. Optional: set the module as temporarily visible to the participant
  7. Scroll down and click on the “Save module” button

Step 3. Create items: question types within your research

Inside the modules you can add items. Items are the questions you want to ask. They form the content of your module.

  1. After you have created your module, on the right side, click on “Content items”
  2. Select the item type you would like to add
  3. A preview screen will open where you can fill in the details of the item (left side)
    Note: On the right side you can see how the item will look like for the participants.
  4. Click on the “Save” button

For more information about item types see https://bmslab.utwente.nl/creating-items/

Step 4. Create interventions: conditions within your research

Next, create an intervention. Interventions are the conditions within your experiment.
e.g. the control condition with only questionnaires or experimental conditions with one version of an intervention.

  1. On the left menu, click on the tab named “Interventions”
  2. On the right side, give your new intervention a title and description (visible to the participants)
  3. Optional: select an image
  4. Click on the “Save intervention” button

Step 5. Link the module to your intervention

You can link your module to the intervention which will make up your study.

  1. After saving your intervention, on the right side, click on “Modules”
  2. Click on the field “Select a module”
  3. In the dropdown field, select the module you want to add
  4. Click on the button “+ ADD”
  5. You have now linked a module to your intervention

You have now created your study on TIIM!