body

Experiments Surveys & forms In surveys, body is the descriptive text under the question; on instructions screens it is the body text of the page and list placeholders are not expanded.

body is the secondary text of a trial, the companion of head. It is used in two places:

1. Form trials (type=form): it becomes the question description, rendered as smaller text under the question title (head). It is NOT the question title; that is head.
2. Instructions screens (trials with no recognizable stimFormat): body is written into the main content area of the screen.

Syntax

Type the text you want shown into the cell; any free text works.

Before display, %variable% placeholders (such as %response%, %rt%, %correct%, %responseCode%, indexed and aggregate forms, participant fields and user variables) are substituted, on both form trials and instructions screens.

Dynamic list values in body are expanded on form trials only; instructions screens show the cell text exactly as written.

Rendering differs by trial kind:

• Form trials: inline Markdown and raw HTML both work; block-level Markdown (for example # Heading) does not.
• Instructions screens: HTML works, Markdown does not. The text is positioned 120 pixels from the top of the screen.

Options

No enumerated values. Any string is display text.

Defaults & missing values

If the column is absent or the cell is left blank, no body text is shown:

• Form trials: the question renders without a description line.
• Instructions screens: the content area keeps whatever the content column already put there.

Works with

• head: companion column; head is the question title, body the smaller description under it. With responseRows, both apply to the containing panel or matrix, not to the individual response rows.
• content: on instructions screens, content is displayed first and body is then written into the same area. A filled body replaces content; an empty body leaves content visible.
• Feedback screens redisplay title and head but never body.
• Mobile layout on instructions screens is chosen from title and head only; body plays no part.
• JSON forms defined with the form column do not read body.
• Results output: the cell value is echoed into the results file for each trial, like every recognized column.

Examples

type	head	body	responseType	responseOptions
form	How satisfied are you?	Consider only the last 7 days.	radio	Low;Medium;High

head renders as the question title, body as smaller description text underneath.

type	title	body	button1
	Instructions	<p>Press <b>Start</b> when ready.</p>	Start

No stimFormat, so the trial is an instructions screen: title in the title area, body as HTML in the content area.

type	head	body	responseType
form	Feedback	Your last response was %response% (RT %rt% ms).	box

Variables are substituted before display.

Tips & gotchas

• Do not mix up the two text columns: head is the question itself (the title), body is the supporting description under it, not the other way around.
• Dynamic list values in body work on form trials but are silently ignored on instructions screens.
• On form trials an empty body simply omits the description line; nothing takes its place in the layout.

Caution

On instructions screens, filling in both content and body silently discards content; only the body text is shown.