How to Drive Follow-Up Tasks Based on Previous Responses

Recollective supports Text Piping, allowing you to insert participants' previous responses into follow-up questions or instructions. However, there may be instances where you need to surface distinct Tasks to participants depending on how they answered a previous question.

Example: We are asking participants what their favourite outdoor activities are. We will have follow-up questions for participants who select Camping. How can we set up our follow-up questions so that only the participants who select Camping will see them?

To drive follow-up Tasks based on previous responses in Recollective:

  1. Ask a closed-ended question (Poll Task, Poll Blank within a Fill the Blanks Task, Prompt Task, Sort and Rank Task, Grid Task)
  2. Create the Follow-Up Task
  3. Configure the Visibility Criteria of the Follow-Up Task
Note: We recommend setting visibility criteria based only on tasks or activities that come before the current task in the sequence. Using future tasks or activities as criteria may result in the current task being skipped.

Let's take a look at how this functions for each of the closed-ended Task Types, using our Outdoor Activity example:

Starting From a Poll Task, Prompt Task, or Fill the Blank Task Polls

Poll Tasks, Prompt Tasks, and poll blanks within Fill the Blank Tasks all function very similarly when configuring Visibility Logic. 

In this example, we’ll say that we asked participants to select their favourite outdoor activity from a list of options. The polls can be singular or multiple-choice; it will work either way!

Now, let’s say we have a follow-up question we want to direct towards any participants who selected ‘Camping’ as a favourite activity. 

We would accomplish this by following these steps:

  1. Create a follow-up Task using any Task Type
  2. Configure the Task as desired
  3. Scroll down to the Visibility Settings
  4. Click ‘Add Criteria’ > ‘Task Response’
  5. From the resulting menu, select the Poll, Prompt, or Fill the Blank Task where we posed our initial question
  6. Select ‘Includes Any’ and choose the target choice (e.g. ‘Camping’)
  7. Click Set Visibility

Starting From a Grid Task

Following our example, let’s say we asked participants to select their favourite outdoor activities using a Grid Task. In the Task, the outdoor activity options were listed as Rows where participants indicated whether they love that activity, simply enjoy it, or do not take part:

In this example, we would want to ask a follow-up question to any participants who indicated they love camping (i.e. any participants who selected the first column for the camping row).

We would accomplish this by following these steps:

  1. Create a follow-up Task using any Task Type
  2. Configure the Task as desired
  3. Scroll down to the Visibility Settings
  4. Click ‘Add Criteria’ > ‘Task Response’
  5. From the resulting menu, select the Grid Task and the column we want to focus on (e.g. ‘I love it!’)
  6. Select ‘Includes Any’ and choose the target row (e.g. ‘Camping’)
  7. Click Set Visibility

This example is one application; there are many ways to limit Task Visibility based on the responses to a Grid Task. In particular, you can:

  • Limit visibility based on any Row that includes Any/All of a select group of Columns
  • Limit visibility based on any Column that includes Any/All of a select group of Rows
  • Limit visibility based on any response that includes a particular row
  • Limit visibility based on any response that includes a particular column

Starting From a Sort and Rank Task

Finally, let’s say we asked participants to select their favourite outdoor activity using a Sort and Rank Task. In the Task, the outdoor activity options were listed as Cards that participants sorted into one of three Groups:

We want to ask a follow-up question to any participants who sorted the Camping card into the ‘I love it!’ group.

To do so, we would need to follow these steps:

  1. Create a follow-up Task using any Task Type
  2. Configure the Task as desired
  3. Scroll down to the Visibility Settings
  4. Click ‘Add Criteria’ > ‘Task Response’
  5. From the resulting menu, select the Sort and Rank Task and the Group we want to focus on (e.g. ‘I love it!’)
  6. Select ‘Includes Any’ and choose the target Card (e.g. ‘Camping’)
  7. Click Set Visibility

This example is one application; there are many ways to limit Task Visibility based on the responses to a Sort and Rank Task. In particular, you can:

  • Limit visibility based on a specific Card that has been sorted into Any of the selected Groups
  • Limit visibility based on a specific Group that includes Any/All of the selected Cards
  • Limit visibility based on any Group that contains a selection of cards
  • Limit visibility based on any Card that has been sorted into a selection of Groups

Previewing Activities with Visibility Criteria

To test your logic and preview the setup, you must use Preview Mode, which can be accessed via the Preview Activity menu within the activity. 

If you do not enable Preview Mode and use the All Tasks option instead, you will see all Tasks programmed in the activity regardless of the Visibility rules.

You can also leverage Preview Mode from the Study Admin > Preview Mode menu, which allows you to preview the entire study while respecting Activity Access and Visibility Rules.

🗣️ Still have questions or want to leave feedback on how we can do better? Contact us at helpdesk@recollective.com.
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