Screeners

The screener is a short questionnaire participants fill out before they can join. Only people who pass become eligible for sessions.

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Question types

• Multiple choice — single or multi-select
• Open text — free-form responses
• Number — numeric input with optional range
• Yes/No — binary

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Disqualification

Each multiple choice option gets an action: Approve, Reject, or (on multi-select) Neutral. Anyone who picks a rejecting answer gets screened out automatically and can’t join sessions. Neutral options don’t count for or against — they let people answer honestly without every choice affecting qualification. For example: if you’re researching a mobile app, you might reject people who answer “I don’t own a smartphone.” Multi-select questions can also limit how many options a participant picks: Unlimited, Exact number, or Range. Every option needs its own text. The question shows a warning when an option is blank or repeats another option, ignoring case and spaces at either end. You can’t publish until you fix it.

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Option order

Two toggles control how options appear to participants:

• Randomize order — shuffles the options for each participant, which removes order bias
• Pin last — keeps the final option in place while the rest shuffle. Use it for “None of the above.”

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Tips for writing screeners

• Don’t lead with your criteria. If you need dog owners, don’t ask “Do you own a dog?” Ask “Which pets do you currently have?” with multiple options. People figure out the “right” answer when questions are too obvious.
• Add an attention check. Something like “Please select the third option” catches people who aren’t reading. Sounds basic, but it works.
• Use disqualification sparingly. You’re balancing sample quality against recruitment speed. Disqualify on dealbreakers only, not nice-to-haves.
• Test your screener before launching. Walk through it yourself. If any question is confusing, participants will answer randomly.