Knowledge Base

Your EthoVision License and Trial Control

Trial Control executes the instructions for each arena separately, however one cannot establish which arena is evaluated first at a specific sample time.

Your EthoVision XT license determines which type of Trial Control you can set up.

• EthoVision XT Base License. You can define a rule to start and stop data recording (Start-Stop trial rule), not sub-rules. You can also use an External command action. You cannot control hardware devices.
• EthoVision XT Base + Trial and Hardware Control Module. You can define a Start/Stop trial rule, and in addition sub-rules that serve as subroutines of the Start-Stop trial rule. Moreover, you can control hardware devices.

To acquire data in an experiment created with the Trial and Hardware Control Module, you must have a license that includes this module.

For more information on your EthoVision XT license, see the EthoVision XT Help.

Analysis of Trial Control Data

The Trial Control function also allows you to easily analyze events that occurred during the trial.

For example, in a conditioning experiment:

• Number of Rewards. Calculate the number of pellets dropped during a trial.
• Latency Between Action and Reward. Calculate the time interval between the time the animal pressed the lever and the time the animal approached the pellet dispenser.
• Number of Failures. Calculate the number of times the animal approached the lever during the period between 'dropping the pellet' and 'animal approaching the pellet dispenser'. That is, how many times the animal pressed the lever when a reward was already available.

You analyze Trial Control data the same way as for the behavioral variables. In the Experiment Explorer, open an Analysis profile, and specify the data you want to analyze (Trial Control event for point events, Trial Control state for time intervals between two events).

Source: EthoVision XT 18 - THC - Trial and Hardware Control, Noldus Information Technology