trier

lately, I've been helping another team in our lab administer the trier test, a standardized stress induction procedure that involves subjects giving a video-recorded speech, then counting backwards by 13 for 5 minutes. it's pretty terrible for the participants (who of course don't know that it's a stress test); what I failed to realize before I actually had to administer them was how awkward it is for the experimenters. the instructions prohibit smiling, nodding, or giving any kind of positive reinforcement while the subject is in the room, which is bad enough, but the worst part of the procedure by far is having to allow 20 seconds of complete silence to elapse at the conclusion of the subject's speech before asking a question. it doesn't sound like it, but those 20 seconds last eternity when you're actually in the room. also, while the subject gets to squirm physically, you're there fighting all your deepest social instincts on the inside and you don't even get to show it.

of course, the test was invented in germany. only the people who gave us the word 'schadenfreude' could have thought it up.