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How to Best Program (Randomize) Between-Subjects Component Nested in Within-Subjects Design

  • December 17, 2025
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Greetings!

To avoid order effects, my team and I need to randomize conditions, groups, and blocks in several ways. Unfortunately, this complexity of Qualtrics programming falls outside of my current repertoire and what I have been able to find on YouTube and by poking around on this community site. I’m crossing my fingers and toes the Qualtrics community “hive mind” can save the day.

We are doing a mixed design, with an overall within-subjects design (two conditions: A, B) that each have three components (1, 2, 3) with a between-subjects aspect in component 3. In component 3, participants need to be randomized to one of three valanced conditions (X, Y, Z).

Within both main conditions (A, B) participants need to see the three components in a chronological, specific order (1, 2, 3) and some of these components have groups (1 and 3 only, not 2). For simplicity’s sake I will only describe A.

For A1, participants need to see all three valences (X, Y, Z) and there are two question blocks for each stimulus. For A2, participants need to see all three valences (X, Y, Z) but there is only one block per stimulus. For A3, participants need to be randomized to only one valanced condition, A3X, A3Y, or A3X, which each have 4-6 stimuli per condition and three blocks of questions per stimulus. 

Specifically, within A3X, A3Y, and A3X, participants need to be shown several groups of question ratings, each block has the same stimulus at the beginning followed by relevant questions (so that we can randomize certain questions within each individual block).

 

Here is the general survey flow (I know I am missing important programming elements):

 

Any guidance on how to program this study (or changes I need to make) based on what I’ve described would be GREATLY appreciated. Thank you in advance for any time, effort, and attention to my question, including just reading this post! 🙏🏽

 

With gratitude,
Rachelle