Flash Cyberball | Charisse L'Pree, Ph.D.
Cyberball, A popular method of inducing ostracism in a laboratory studies investigating social exclusion, was originally developed by Williams, Cheung, & Choi (2000). Until now, this program was only available in Java, but this requires the study to be conducted on dedicated computers in the lab. Flash Cyberball is composed of 2 simple Shockwave Flash files that can easily be embedded into a website to facilitate the collection of data online.
These Flash interfaces provide a slightly nuanced experience; participants enter their initials and select a color to ensure that the participant identifies with their avatar (Lim, 2006; Cordova & Lepper, 1996). The computerized agents also feature randomly assigned initials and colors and appear at staggered intervals to increase the illusion of remote participants. At the start of the game, participants receive the ball 1/3 of the time. After this initial training period (20 seconds), participants are either included and receive the ball 1/3 of the time, or excluded completely while the other two participants toss the ball back and forth. This manipulation period lasts 70 seconds.
CONTROL (INCLUSION): The participant continues to be included and receives about 1/3 of tosses throughout the game.
EXCLUSION: The participant is completely excluded from the game after the initial training period and the computerized agents toss the ball back and forth.
Please email a brief description of your study if you are interested in utilizing this Flash Interface.