I am the Human Guinea Pig

Step right up to see the hideous, the horrible, the putrescent, Human Guinea Pig. Yep, that's me. Up at "o'dark thirty," I've already been the subject of a University of Washington Psychology experiment this morning. While it might make a better story to say that I've volunteered myself to science to pad my income, it's not really true. I went to help out a friend who is working on her PhD.

It was kind of fun, although it was two hours staring straight into a computer screen (as if I don't do that enough already). The basic experiment centered around the identification of the highest numeral out of four which would pop on the screen very quickly in a two by two pattern. There were a couple iterations of the experiment, some with digits, some with words, and some felt so fast as to just be ridiculous. I'd say more but I don't really want to unveil too much about an experiment which is not published yet. Suffice it to say that if you say "EF" in some academic journal participating in a UW experiment, that's me, unless, of course, the guy is a loon, in which case it's obviously not.

The bonus to all of this was that I was bribed with some sweets that I brought into the office for the folks.