Using SSEL Services

SSEL Protocol

The Social Science Experimental Lab, lab equipment, and subject pool are available for use on request by NYU and NYUAD faculty, students, and visiting faculty. Experiments conducted at the SSEL Lab, using SSEL laptops off-campus, or using the SSEL subject pool for other experiments must satisfy the following protocol:

• Subjects take one or more decisions. If more than one decision is taken, the exact number of decisions is known, or if it is not known, the rule that determines when they will stop is known.
• Subjects are told if they are taking a decision on their own, or if the outcome also depends on what others choose. If it also depends on what others choose, the way in which they are grouped together is explained to them.
• What they know and what others know is told to everyone. That is, if there is something each subject is told in private, all subjects know that others have such private information.
• If subjects are asked to take decisions in a practice run, or dry run, those decisions do not affect their final payoffs.
• The way by which payoffs are determined is explained to the subjects. The payoffs of one subject are not shown to other subjects (unless all subjects are paid the same amount).

Human Subjects Certification

All experimenters who use the SSEL Lab, SSEL laptops off-campus, Online studies via SSEL, or subjects recruited through SSEL must first apply to use the SSEL Services. Once approved, they must complete certification by the CITI program. Please complete the tutorial for the course for social and behavioral sciences.

Once certified, please print a pdf version of the certification and email it to ssel@nyu.edu, and ask to be added to the SSEL protocol.

Apply to Use SSEL Services

All experimenters who use the SSEL Lab, SSEL equipment off-campus, or SSEL subjects for a lab experiment elsewhere on campus must first apply to use the lab.

All experimenters who want to run an online experiment using the SSEL Online Protocol must first apply to run an online study.

Note that if you are an undergraduate or graduate student, an email will be sent to your adviser to confirm that they have your approval to conduct this project. If you have not discussed the proposal with your thesis adviser and have not yet received approval to apply to use lab services, then you should not submit an application until you have approval.

If you have any trouble with the application process, please contact ssel@nyu.edu.

Portability

The laboratory has 20 laptops that can be taken outside of NYUAD in order to conduct research. However, if the experiment is to be conducted on the NYUAD campus or within reasonable commuting distance of NYUAD, unless there is a significant reason why subjects cannot come to the laboratory or would be reluctant to do so, the experiment must be conducted in the laboratory. Laptops can only be checked out by researchers who sign release forms taking responsibility for any missing equipment.

Required Documents

Experimentalists who use SSEL lab using the SSEL protocol must use the IRB approved SSEL Consent Form and SSEL receipt. Please email ssel@nyu.edu to request for the forms. They must then submit the signed forms to the Finance department for reconciliation of their funds.

Usage Citation

Any research and/or teaching conducted using laboratory facilities in any way must be acknowledged and cited as such. A suggested citation format is:

This research was conducted at the Social Science Experimental Laboratory at New York University in Abu Dhabi in MONTH(S)/YEAR.

Special Requests

If you have any research or teaching needs that you think qualify as special requests please discuss these with prof. John Wooders. While some requests can be accommodated, depending on circumstance others may not be, so we apologize in advance.