PsyScript Downloads

The original PsyScript download page on subjectpool.com distributed the Mac application binaries, sample experiment files, and supporting documentation for researchers using the University of Edinburgh’s experiment-authoring tool. This page archives what we know about the download history and points to current resources for researchers maintaining legacy PsyScript codebases.

About the downloads

The PHP script that originally served the download list eventually broke after MySQL deprecations made it unrunnable on modern hosting. Wayback Machine snapshots of this page from the broken era return raw PHP error text rather than the binary download list. The downloads themselves were generally:

PsyScript application binary

Distributed as a Mac application bundle (.app)
Multiple versions across the application’s active development period
Compatible with Mac OS Classic and early OS X versions
Compressed in .sit or .zip archives depending on the release

Sample experiment files

PsyScript shipped with example experiment files demonstrating common designs: simple reaction-time tasks, Stroop-style interference experiments, lexical-decision tasks, recognition memory studies. These samples were the most useful pedagogical resource for researchers learning the tool.

Documentation packages

PDF versions of the manual and supplementary technical documents were occasionally distributed alongside the binaries for offline reference.

For researchers needing PsyScript today

If you’re maintaining or extending an existing PsyScript codebase, your options are:

Internet Archive Wayback Machine — the binary archives may be accessible through earlier Wayback snapshots of the original download page (try snapshots from before 2015, before the PHP broke)
Direct contact with the Edinburgh Psychology Department — the department may still maintain copies of the application binaries for legacy research support
Academic preservation projects — services like Software Heritage and the Library of Congress digital archive sometimes preserve research software binaries

Modern alternatives

For new research projects, modern experiment-authoring tools have entirely superseded PsyScript:

PsychoPy — Python-based, open source, runs on Mac/Windows/Linux and increasingly in browsers
jsPsych — JavaScript framework for browser-based experiments, dominant choice for online studies
Gorilla.sc — commercial cloud-based experiment platform with strong visual authoring
OpenSesame — open-source, drag-and-drop interface, used in teaching
E-Prime — commercial Windows-based, still common in some labs

If you’re choosing tooling for a new project, jsPsych for online studies and PsychoPy for lab-based studies are the strongest current defaults. The conceptual framework PsyScript introduced — trial-based abstractions, automated response logging, randomisation schemes — translates directly to all of these tools.

PsyScript Downloads