Battery guide
Food Choice and Self-Control Battery guide
Four tasks for eating behavior research: attention to food, delay discounting of food, and withholding and stopping responses.
- Guide version
- 1.2.0
- Battery version
- 1.0.0
What it measures
Who it is for: Eating behavior research.
It measures Attentional bias to food, Delay discounting of food, Response inhibition and Action cancellation.
Attention: Keeping attention on a task and picking out what matters.
Executive function: Planning, switching rules, handling conflict and making decisions.
Response inhibition: Stopping or holding back a response.
Scores describe how a person performs on these tasks. Research use only.
Tests in order
The tests run in this order. A study started from the battery keeps the order and the settings.
1. Food-Picture Dot-Probe. Measures whether attention is drawn toward food. A food picture and a non-food picture appear side by side for 3 seconds, then a dot replaces one of them and participants press the left or right arrow for its side.
2. Food Delay Discounting. Measures how much a delay lowers the value of a favorite snack food, using adjusting choices between an amount today and 100 later. The food is hypothetical.
3. Go/No-Go Task. Measures response inhibition by requiring participants to respond to 'go' stimuli and withhold responses to 'no-go' stimuli.
4. Stop-Signal Task. Measures action cancellation by asking participants to make speeded left/right responses and withhold the response when a stop signal appears.
| Order | Test | Domain | Time |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Food-Picture Dot-Probe | Attention | 10 to 12 minutes |
| 2 | Food Delay Discounting | Executive function | 3 to 5 minutes |
| 3 | Go/No-Go Task | Response inhibition | 4 to 5 minutes |
| 4 | Stop-Signal Task | Response inhibition | 5 to 7 minutes |
Time and devices
Allow about 29 minutes for the whole battery. The table gives each test's time.
The battery has timed tests. Participants need a desktop or laptop with a mouse or trackpad, and the timed tests run in full screen. Tablets and phones cannot run it.
On a desktop or laptop the screen must be at least 1024 by 700 pixels.
Participants need Chrome, Edge, Firefox or Safari.
| Test | Timing | Devices |
|---|---|---|
| Food-Picture Dot-Probe | Timed | Desktop or laptop |
| Food Delay Discounting | Untimed | Desktop or laptop, tablet or phone |
| Go/No-Go Task | Timed | Desktop or laptop |
| Stop-Signal Task | Timed | Desktop or laptop |
Languages
Runs in all eight participant languages.
How to give it
Start a study from the battery in the app. The tests, their order and their settings are already set and stay fixed. If you change, reorder or customize a test, the study becomes a custom study and no longer carries the battery.
Each test opens with its instructions. Participants see these:
Food-Picture Dot-Probe: Press the left or right arrow to show where the dot appears, as quickly and accurately as you can.
Food Delay Discounting: Pick your favorite kind of snack, then choose between an amount of it today and 100 after a delay. The food is hypothetical.
Go/No-Go Task: Press the spacebar when you see a GREEN circle (Go). Do NOT press anything when you see a RED circle (No-Go). Respond as quickly and accurately as you can.
Stop-Signal Task: Respond quickly to left and right arrows. If the arrow turns red, try to stop yourself and do not press a key.
| Step | Before you invite participants |
|---|---|
| 1 | Decide when participants take the battery relative to their last meal, and record the hours since they ate if your protocol needs them. |
| 2 | Tell participants that the snacks in the choice task are hypothetical. |
| 3 | Ask participants to use a desktop or laptop in a quiet room, in one sitting. |
| 4 | Review quality flags before comparing groups. |
How each test is scored
The server scores each test when the participant finishes it. The primary score is the one the app compares with a norm. The other scores are reported with it.
Every result records its scoring version. For this battery they are Food-Picture Dot-Probe 1.0.0, Food Delay Discounting 1.0.0, Go/No-Go Task 1.0.0 and Stop-Signal Task 1.2.0.
| Test | Score | What it is | Better |
|---|---|---|---|
| Food-Picture Dot-Probe | Attentional Bias to Food (ms, primary) | Mean response time when the dot replaced the non-food picture minus when it replaced the food picture, on correct critical trials after trimming. | Positive values mean attention was drawn to food |
| Food-Picture Dot-Probe | Food-Side RT (ms) | Mean correct response time when the dot replaced the food picture, after trimming. | Lower is faster |
| Food-Picture Dot-Probe | Object-Side RT (ms) | Mean correct response time when the dot replaced the non-food picture, after trimming. | Lower is faster |
| Food-Picture Dot-Probe | High-Calorie Bias (ms) | The bias score from the pairs with high-calorie foods. | Positive values mean attention was drawn to high-calorie food |
| Food-Picture Dot-Probe | Low-Calorie Bias (ms) | The bias score from the pairs with low-calorie foods. | Positive values mean attention was drawn to low-calorie food |
| Food-Picture Dot-Probe | Filler RT (ms) | Mean correct response time on the filler pairs of two objects. | Lower is faster |
| Food-Picture Dot-Probe | Accuracy (proportion) | Share of all test trials answered with the dot's side. | Higher is better |
| Food-Picture Dot-Probe | Valid Critical Trials (trials) | Correct critical trials kept after trimming, out of 80. | More trials give a steadier bias score |
| Food-Picture Dot-Probe | Bias, Odd Trials (ms) | The bias score from odd-numbered critical trials. | For split-half reliability across a study |
| Food-Picture Dot-Probe | Bias, Even Trials (ms) | The bias score from even-numbered critical trials. | For split-half reliability across a study |
| Food Delay Discounting | Area Under the Curve (proportion, primary) | Area under the indifference points, with delays and amounts scaled from 0 to 1. A value of 1 means no discounting. | Higher means less discounting |
| Food Delay Discounting | Discount Rate (k) | Hyperbolic k fitted to the indifference points with V = A / (1 + kD), with the delay D in days. | Higher means steeper discounting |
| Food Delay Discounting | Indifference Point at 1 Month (items) | Amount of the chosen snack today judged equal to 100 in 1 month. Points are also reported at 1 week, 6 months, 1 year and 5 years. | Higher means less discounting |
| Food Delay Discounting | Immediate Choice Rate (proportion) | Share of all choices that took the amount today. | Informational |
| Food Delay Discounting | Consistency Flag | 1 when the indifference points pass both Johnson and Bickel (2008) checks. 0 when a point rises more than 20 above the one before it, or the last point is not at least 10 below the first. | 1 supports interpretation |
| Go/No-Go Task | Mean Go RT (ms) | Average reaction time on correct Go trials. Reflects processing speed for respond conditions. | Lower is better |
| Go/No-Go Task | Go Accuracy (proportion) | Proportion of Go trials with a correct response. Low values suggest inattention. | Higher is better |
| Go/No-Go Task | No-Go Accuracy (proportion) | Proportion of No-Go trials correctly withheld. Directly measures inhibitory success. | Higher is better |
| Go/No-Go Task | d-Prime (primary) | Signal detection sensitivity: Z(hit rate) - Z(false alarm rate). Separates discriminability from response bias. | Higher is better |
| Go/No-Go Task | Commission Errors | Responses on No-Go trials (false alarms). Primary index of inhibitory failure. | Lower is better |
| Go/No-Go Task | Omission Errors | Missed responses on Go trials. Indicates lapses in sustained attention. | Lower is better |
| Stop-Signal Task | Stop-Signal Reaction Time (ms, primary) | Integration-method estimate of the covert stopping latency: the nth fastest go RT minus the mean stop-signal delay, with n the number of go trials times p(respond|signal). Every go trial counts, choice errors included, and a go trial with no response counts at the slowest go RT (Verbruggen et al. 2019). | Lower is better when validity flags pass |
| Stop-Signal Task | SSRT, Correct Go Trials Only (ms) | The estimate used before scoring version 1.1.0: correct go RTs only, with go omissions and choice errors left out. It runs shorter when go trials were missed. For comparing with earlier results. | Informational |
| Stop-Signal Task | Stop Success Rate (proportion) | Proportion of stop trials where the participant successfully withheld a response. | Near 0.50 is expected under a working staircase |
| Stop-Signal Task | Go Reaction Time (ms) | Mean reaction time on correct go trials. | Informational |
| Stop-Signal Task | Go Accuracy (proportion) | Proportion of go trials answered with the correct arrow key. | Higher is better |
| Stop-Signal Task | Failed-Stop RT (ms) | Mean reaction time on stop trials where the participant failed to inhibit. | Should usually be faster than go RT |
| Stop-Signal Task | Valid SSRT Flag (0/1) | Indicates whether core SSRT validity checks passed. | 1 indicates interpretable SSRT |
Session quality rules
The app checks every session when it scores it and records one of four states.
An Invalid session stays in the study's results, labelled with its reason, and does not count toward norms.
A session can carry warnings and still be valid. The results list the warnings next to the scores.
| State | What it means |
|---|---|
| Norm-ready | The session passed every check and a norm exists for it, so the app can show a percentile. |
| Raw-only | The scores are usable, but the app shows no percentile. Typical reasons are no norm for the test, changed settings, or a warning that makes a comparison unfair, such as a restart or a screen too short for the display. |
| Invalid technical | The setup broke the timing or the task. Examples are leaving full screen, a browser tab that lost focus during a timed test, and long pauses. |
| Invalid behavioral | The responses suggest the task was not done as asked. Examples are a failed attention check, repeated switching away from the task, and accuracy at or below chance on a choice task. |
Published norms used
No published norm is used for any test in this battery.
ConductCognition also builds norms from its own participants. An age band of a test uses them once it holds at least 50 valid sessions on the same device and input type, run with standard settings and scored with the current scoring version. Sessions from paying customers' studies and from clinical or patient samples do not count.
A report shows a percentile only when the app has stored one for that session. Otherwise it shows the raw scores.
Every reference group covers ages 18 and over. No reference group covers a participant under 18, so their report shows raw scores only, and their sessions do not count toward norms.
How to cite
ConductScience, Inc. Food Choice and Self-Control Battery guide, version 1.2.0. ConductCognition. https://conductcognition.com/batteries/food-choice/guide
Cite the guide version you used. Name the battery version (1.0.0) and the scoring versions listed in this guide.