Using SONA

The Ivey BehavLab has two subscriptions to SONA, one is for our Student Credit Participant Pool and one is for our Paid Participant Pool.  They are identical in use but you must be certain that you are signing in to the correct SONA to sign up for credit studies.  We cannot credit you for studies run through the SONA Paid Participant Pool website.

When classes start you will receive an email from the SONA system with your login ID and a temporary password at the top of the email, a message from us at the BehavLab, and at the bottom of that email will be your unique SONA ID code. 

When you go to the SONA website (https://uwostudent.sona-systems.com) you sign in with the temporary password and you will be asked to create a permanent password.  Even if you don’t plan to participate right away in any studies you are advised to sign in and complete this step because otherwise the temporary password will expire.  It’s also a good idea to at least make yourself familiar with your account there.

Note that you can change your email address if this is not your preferred email.

Note also your IDENTITY CODE. This is the code you will be asked for at every study appointment!

Signing Up to a Study

When you sign in your home page will look like this. You have a number of options available and you can make changes to your account information, access FAQs, and book studies.  Click on the green bar “View Available Studies” to check out the currently running studies.

Here we can see that there are four studies running but only three have timeslots that are available or not currently full. The study descriptions are only brief descriptions, and you can see if the study has any restrictions.  You will only see studies that you are eligible for if there is a class restriction as seen in this example.  Clicking on the dark green bar “Timeslots Available” will take you to a page with more information about the study