26.08.09 - The Observer XT useful tool in multimodal research
A study by Zimmerman and others showed that The Observer XT is a useful tool in multimodal research. The integration and synchronization of these multimodal signals in The Observer XT allows the user to draw a more complete picture of the
phenomena under study. These findings have recently been published in Behavioral Research Methods.
The Observer was originally developed as a manual event recorder for the collection, management, analysis,
and presentation of observational data in animals. Because of the flexibility of later versions, it became clear
that The Observer was suitable for almost any study involving collection of observational data in both animals
and humans. Furthermore, the most recent version of The Observer (The Observer XT) allows the integration
and synchronization of multimodal signals from various sources, such as observational, video, tracking, and
physiological data.
The article by Zimmerman and others describes how The Observer XT was used to integrate and synchronize video,
observational, tracking, and physiological data from an experiment carried out in 2001 at the Wageningen
Institute of Animal Sciences of Wageningen University and Research Centre.
Zimmerman PH, Bolhuis JE, Willemsen A, Meyer ES, Noldus LPJJ. The Observer XT: A tool for the integrateion and synchronization of multimodal signals. Behav Res Methods 2009, 41:731-735.
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