How do you create a psychology experiment which is engaging and enjoyable for participants, yet also well-controlled by scientific standards? In this talk, I will present several real experiments developed by myself and my colleague Peter Battaglia which immerse participants in a rich, 3D environment. Using Python, our experiments simulate a semi-realistic world and present a level of interactivity similar to that found in popular physics-based video games such as Angry Birds.

To create such "game-like" experiments, we use the Panda3D video game engine. Panda3D exposes the ability to capture key presses, track the mouse, display text, simulate physics, and render 3D graphics, all with the level of precision required by a well-controlled experiment. Furthermore, because Panda3D uses Python, it integrates well with powerful tools such as NumPy and SciPy. The result is that code involved in running behavioral experiments can be reused for model simulations and data analysis.

During this talk, audience members will be able to collectively participate in demos of our experiments. After each demo, I will walk through the steps that were necessary to create the experiment, emphasizing both where there are differences between implementing an interactive experiment versus an actual video game, and how the experiments fit within a larger theme of Python in science.