Read - The Second PE Survey -- A Thunder's Place group project

HI Remek, I’m glad you accepted the offer, because I think this project will get overwhelming to complete in 8 days if we don’t start with some sort of “semi-complete” rough draft to modify.

I’ll take care of it tonight. I should warn y’all that it’s not going to be incredibly ambitious: it will follow the outline I presented very closely. Xeno, Remek, XL, and others can modify it to make it more useful.

Frankly, Remek, I didn’t think your last effort (the original survey) was all that problematic. The main downside was insufficient forethought re: data analysis. What I’m looking forward to doing is seeing how total hours on various exercises, among other things, combine to predict outcome. For example, with hanging I’m curious whether highest weight regularly hung makes an independent contribution to total gains, over and above the contribution of total time hanging. The two variables are confounded in many guys’ individual PE histories.

When I read Hobby’s complaints about Remek’s first survey, I got the impression that Hobby doesn’t think a survey of any kind will be worthwhile, since everyone’s PE program is drastically different and idiosyncratic and we will be able to measure only some very rough indicators of what the program has looked like — never a complete picture. That’s certainly a defensible viewpoint — he and I both agree that epidemiological studies in medicine suffer from some similar problems — but I still think we may be able to learn something from the survey if we do it a bit better than last time.

By the way, I agree with you that participants whose measurements are missing won’t be very useful. However, keep in mind that there are other quasi-dependent variables we will be looking at, such as changes in erection angle, erection curvature, (dis)coloration, injuries, etc.

Sounds good PG!

Thank you for choosing to participate in the Thunder’s Place PE Survey!

Please try to answer the following questions as accurately as you can. If you have no idea about the answer to a given question — if, for example, you never took a starting girth measurement, or if you cannot make a reasonably informed calculation of your total hours doing a particular exercise — please skip the question rather than guessing wildly. Use your best judgment about what degree of guessing would be appropriate (e.g., if you remember pumping for 6 to 8 consecutive weeks at one point, “7 weeks” would be a fine answer).

It is extremely important that you answer all questions truthfully. Even if you have lied about any of these matters in your posts at Thunder’s Place, please be honest in this survey. Your individual data will not be connected to your username in the analysis process.

Section I: Your PE Regimen

Please answer the questions corresponding to each exercise that has been a substantial component of your PE career; please skip any sections about exercises that have never been part of your PE regimen for at least two weeks.

A. Jelqing

1. How many hours total have you spent jelqing during your entire PE career? For example, if you jelqed for approximately 15 minutes per day, 6 days a week, for 16 weeks, that would be a total of 24 hours spent jelqing. (If you gauge each jelqing session by number of jelqs rather than by time spent jelqing, try determining how many seconds each of your strokes take, so that you can calculate total time spent jelqing.) ____ hours

2. How many minutes per day, on average, have you spent jelqing when it has been part of your PE regimen? ____ minutes

3. How many days per week, on average, have you spent jelqing when it has been part of your PE regimen? ____ days

4. During your PE career, what has been the longest period of consecutive weeks during which you jelqed at least 3 days per week? ____ weeks

5. When jelqing has been part of your PE regimen, what percentage of jelqing sessions have been preceded by a warm-up (e.g., a hot wrap)? ____ %

6. When jelqing has been part of your PE regimen, what percentage of times have you applied heat during the jelqing session (e.g., with a lamp)? ____ %

7. What percentage of your jelqing sessions have been wet jelqing sessions (i.e., using a lubricant)? ____ %

1. How many hours total have you spent manually stretching during your entire PE career? For example, if you stretched for approximately 25 minutes per day, 4 days a week, for 7 weeks, that would be a total of 11.67 hours spent stretching. (Try not to include rest-time between active stretches in your calculations, if possible.) ____ hours

2. How many minutes per day, on average, have you spent manually stretching when it has been part of your PE regimen? ____ minutes

3. How many days per week, on average, have you spent manually stretching when it has been part of your PE regimen? ____ days

4. During your PE career, what has been the longest period of consecutive weeks during which you manually stretched at least 3 days per week? ____ weeks

5. When manual stretching has been part of your PE regimen, what percentage of stretching sessions have been preceded by a warm-up (e.g., a hot wrap)? ____ %

6. When manual stretching has been part of your PE regimen, what percentage of times have you applied heat during the stretching session (e.g., with a lamp)? ____ %

1. How many hours total have you spent hanging weights during your entire PE career? For example, if you hung weights for 6 sets of 20 minutes per day, 7 days a week, for 100 weeks, that would be a total of 1400 hours spent hanging. ____ hours

2. How many minutes per day, on average, have you spent hanging when it has been part of your PE regimen? ____ minutes

3. How many days per week, on average, have you spent hanging when it has been part of your PE regimen? ____ days

4. During your PE career, what has been the longest period of consecutive weeks during which you hung at least 3 days per week? ____ weeks

5. When hanging has been part of your PE regimen, what percentage of hanging sessions have been preceded by a warm-up (e.g., a hot wrap)? ____ %

6. When hanging has been part of your PE regimen, what percentage of times have you applied heat during the hanging session (e.g., with a lamp)? ____ %

7. What is the maximum weight, in pounds, that you have hung regularly during your PE career? (“Regularly” is defined as “used for at least one 10+ minute set for at least 3 days in one week.”) ____ pounds

1. How many hours total have you spent pumping during your entire PE career? For example, if you pumped for 3 sets of 10 minutes per day, 4 days a week, for 8 weeks, that would be a total of 16 hours spent pumping. ____ hours

2. How many minutes per day, on average, have you spent pumping when it has been part of your PE regimen? ____ minutes

3. How many days per week, on average, have you spent pumping when it has been part of your PE regimen? ____ days

4. During your PE career, what has been the longest period of consecutive weeks during which you pumped at least 3 days per week? ____ weeks

5. When pumping has been part of your PE regimen, what percentage of pumping sessions have been preceded by a warm-up (e.g., a hot wrap)? ____ %

6. When pumping has been part of your PE regimen, what percentage of times have you applied heat during the pumping session (e.g., with a lamp)? ____ %

7. What is the maximum pressure that you have used regularly during your pumping career? (“Regularly” is defined as “used for at least one 5+ minute set for at least 3 days in one week.”) ____ inches Hg

1. How many hours total have you spent using an extender device during your entire PE career? For example, if you used an extender for 5 hours per day, 5 days a week, for 50 weeks, that would be a total of 1250 hours spent wearing an extender. ____ hours

2. How many minutes per day, on average, have you spent using an extender when it has been part of your PE regimen? ____ minutes

3. How many days per week, on average, have you spent using an extender when it has been part of your PE regimen? ____ days

4. During your PE career, what has been the longest period of consecutive weeks during which you used an extender at least 3 days per week? ____ weeks

1. How many hours total have you spent doing manual girth squeezes during your entire PE career? For example, if you did squeezes for 5 minutes per day, 3 days a week, for 8 weeks, that would be a total of 2 hours spent doing squeezes. (Try not to include rest-time between active squeezes in your calculations, if possible.) ____ hours

2. How many minutes per day, on average, have you spent doing girth squeezes when they have been part of your PE regimen? ____ minutes

3. How many days per week, on average, have you spent doing girth squeezes when they have been part of your PE regimen? ____ days

4. During your PE career, what has been the longest period of consecutive weeks during which you used an extender at least 3 days per week? ____ weeks

5. When girth squeezes have been part of your PE regimen, what percentage of sessions have been preceded by a warm-up (e.g., a hot wrap)? ____ %

6. When girth squeezes have been part of your PE regimen, what percentage of times have you applied heat during the squeezing session (e.g., with a lamp)? ____ %

1. How many hours total have you spent clamping during your entire PE career? For example, if you clamped for 3 sets of 5 minutes per day, 4 days a week, for 4 weeks, that would be a total of 4 hours spent clamping. ____ hours

2. How many minutes per day, on average, have you spent clamping when it has been part of your PE regimen? ____ minutes

3. How many days per week, on average, have you spent clamping when it has been part of your PE regimen? ____ days

4. During your PE career, what has been the longest period of consecutive weeks during which you clamped at least 3 days per week? ____ weeks

5. When clamping has been part of your PE regimen, what percentage of sessions have been preceded by a warm-up (e.g., a hot wrap)? ____ %

6. When clamping has been part of your PE regimen, what percentage of times have you applied heat during the clamping session (e.g., with a lamp)? ____ %

1. How many breaks of at least 3-weeks duration have you taken during your PE career? By “break,” we mean a complete cessation of (or at least a drastic reduction of) PE activities. ____ breaks

2. How many minutes per day, on average, have you spent masturbating or engaging in other sexual activity (e.g., intercourse) with an erection during periods of active PEing? For example, if your average week contains three 10-minute masturbatory sessions and two 30-minute sessions of intercourse, then you average 12.9 minutes per day. ____ minutes per day

3. During periods of active PEing, how many times per week, on average, have you had ejaculatory orgasms? ____ times per week

4. How many tobacco cigarettes have you smoked per day, on average, during your periods of active PEing? ____ cigarettes

5. What percentage of days have you included an erectile enhancement pill such as Viagra as part of your PE regimen? ____ %

6. What percentage of days have you worn an all-day mild-stretching device (e.g., Monty’s PE weights) during your periods of active PEing? ____ %

6. At what age did you begin PEing? ____ years old

7. For how many weeks did you follow the Newbie Routine prescribed at Thunder’s Place (or an even gentler beginner’s program) before trying any more advanced PE regimen? ____ weeks

Section III: PE Outcomes

1. What was your bone-pressed erect length before beginning any PE? ____ inches

2. What was your erect girth (circumference, not width!), measured at midshaft, before beginning any PE? ____ inches

3. What was your erect girth, measured at base, before beginning any PE? ____ inches

4. What is your current bone-pressed erect length? ____ inches

5. What is your current erect girth, measured at midshaft? ____ inches

6. What is your current erect girth, measured at base? ____ inches

7. Did you have imperfect erections before starting PE? In other words, do you believe your pre-PE measurements would be greater if you could have achieved a fuller erection at the time? ____ (1 = yes; 0 = no)

8. How has your erection quality been affected by PEing? ____ (-1 = erection quality has gotten worse from PEing; 0 = erection quality has not been affected by PEing; 1 = erection quality has improved from PEing)

9. How has the shape of your erection been affected by PEing? ____ (-1 = PEing has increased the curvature of my penis [or added a curve where there previously was none]; 0 = PEing hasn’t affected my penis’s shape; 1 = PEing has straightened my penis to some degree [i.e., decreased the curvature])

10. How has the angle of your erection been affected by PEing? ____ (-1 = PEing has lowered my erection angle; 0 = PE hasn’t affected my erection angle; 1 = PEing has raised my erection angle)

11. Has PEing darkened or otherwise changed the color of your penis to a noticeable degree? (1 = yes; 0 = no)

12. How many times in your PE career have you experienced an injury severe enough to require you to majorly reduce or take a break from your PE regimen for at least 3 days? ____ times

Please answer Questions 13-15 only if you have achieved gains via your PE program.

13. What is the longest period, after making PE gains, that you have taken off from all PE activities? ____ weeks

14. For how many weeks, prior to the beginning of the aforementioned break period, did you have the size with which you began the break? ____ weeks

14. Did you lose more than 10% of your length or your girth gains during the aforementioned break period? ____ (1 = yes; 0 = no)

PG-

Great Job!

Random comment: If possible, it would be good to quantify total time in active PE and total time in decon break.

You did all that in one night?

I am out the door at the moment, so I cannot go into detail of what I think needs to be changed. For the most part, the layout is great. You truly did a good job PG. However, I think some of it needs to be condensed (as Thunder said earlier in this thread), AND I believe we can change quite a few of the questions around to make it easier on the user.

I will look at it more in detail tonight.

Hey guys, I look forward to seeing your modifications. Remek, I agree it can be shorter (although remember it won’t look nearly as intimidating in the final programmed version, assuming that the exercise sections, for example, are collapsed until a user clicks one…). I just wanted to include a whole lot of stuff in my first draft to see what people thought were worthwhlie things to chase, and which can be left behind.

Also, to anyone who has made suggestions about additional things we should look at in the survey, please don’t think I ignored you because I didn’t think your ideas were good. I was just lazy putting this together and did it based strictly on my original outline. Please fill in the holes with questions that would get at any additional concerns.

Your list of questions is fanatic. I think you did a thoroughly great job. I am going to add my opinion, and if you or anyone else disagrees let it be known. This project is a democracy. Democracy takes discussion and communication.

First line of discussion – The first section of questions:

IMO, question one is extremely tough on the participant. We are asking the participant to calculate. Their job isn’t to calculate – that is our task.

Instead I recommend changing question one. Question one could ask, “How long have you spent PEing – not including breaks?” This question could be answered in weeks, months, or years (or a combination). We could then take questions 2 & 3, along with the new question 1 to calculate how many hours the user has spent jelqing total over the entire PE career.

Walla! We do the calculations. The user answers simple questions. Everyone is happy.

If I were to take this survey, all of my data would be inaccurate for questions 4 -7.
I like what you are trying do to. You want pure, 100 percent statistics. No games, just numbers. Unfortunately, I don’t think we can do that in this particular survey. I believe these questions would be GREAT for an experiment. In an experiment, we can record the data beforehand – obtaining accurate results.

But in this case, many people don’t record the data you’re requesting. I don’t. I couldn’t even guess my percentages for questions 5 – 7. However, if you gave me a list of choices – I think I could answer them accurately.

Let’s start with what I think we should do with the percentage questions: 5 – 7

Now, I could be wrong on this, but I think a question similar to the one I used on the last survey would be better for question #5

Question 5: When jelqing has been part of your PE regimen, is your session preceded by a warm-up?
Yes, Always
Most of the time, yes
Sometimes – approximately 50 percent of the time
Rarely
No

I think this allows the user to give a more accurate answer. It gives them a choice, thus making it easier on them. Questions 6 and 7 could be done the same way.

Question 6: When jelqing has been part of your PE regimen, is heat applied during the jelqing session? (i.e. using a heat lamp)

Yes, Always
Most of the time, yes
Sometimes – approximately 50 percent of the time
Rarely
No

Question 7: When jelqing, do you use a lubricant?

Yes, Always
Most of the time, yes
Sometimes – approximately 50 percent of the time
Rarely
No

Question 4 — I am confused on the data we are collecting for this question. Are we aiming to gather knowledge on plateaus, consecutive PE, or … ? Maybe we could modify this question to inquiry the number of breaks the user takes.

Again, PG, I want you to know I did you an excellent job. A much better first draft then I was going to provide. Also, I am not doubting your questioning, rather offering my input and my opinion. In the end, I think something in between what I am asking and what you are proposing is going to be the best bet. What do you think?

Thunder, and the others, what is your opinion on this matter?

I am going to skip to the next set of questions now:

Yeah, that would work much better. I was thinking sloppily when I wrote that one. Essentially, total number of hours doing particular exercises is the main predictor variable I’m really interested in, so I carelessly put that as quesiton 1 then threw in those other questions.

So, let’s make question 1 (or whatever order we decide for 1-3) “how many weeks have you included exercise X in your routine, excluding breaks…”.

I’d like to hear other guys’ opinions on this. The thing is, Remek, the multiple choices you suggest will need to be converted into numbers for analysis anyway. I’m thinking the best way to do this may be to include multiple choices, as you suggest, with verbal markers AND percentage markers (e.g., “Rarely — probably less than 20% of the time”).

I’m curious whether sticking with PE consistently for many weeks in a row is a key to achieving gains. For example, do hangers who have never hung for more than 5 weeks straight, without interruption, never achieve gains as great as those who have hung for 20 weeks straight, even when controlling for total hours spent hanging? But I’m very open to eliminating this question or modifying it.

By the way, Remek, thanks for the kind words. I won’t take offense about any of this survey stuff, so please do critique as carefully as you can. Your suggestions above were excellent catches.

Great. I am glad you are being a stand-up guy. Some guys can be fairly stubborn regarding things they spent time on. I enjoy working with someone who is open, as I am.

I really like the idea of using both verbal markers and percentage markers for questions 5-7.

Question 4, I don’t have a problem with. You may be on to something. Let’s leave it for now, and as we add more questions we can see where we stand. I am going to grab a drink and look at section two.

I would be stubborn if I had spent a lot of time and crafted a survey that I thought was extremely well-designed. But this one, like any PE survey I could think up, is heavily flawed. I’m hoping plenty of guys will chime in before our deadline so that we can heavily revise this and end up with something less flawed, if still very imperfect ;) .

Section II: Additional PE-Related Variables

Again, my opinions – let me know what you think.

I think two options should be added:
1) I have taken no breaks.
2) I have taken too many breaks to count (I myself would fall in this category)

I like this question. Maybe another example, but we will add more on this later. Also, we might have to change the time frame. For instance, what if a man spends an average of one day a week engaging in sexual activity? What if this one day typically only lasts 2 -3 minutes? That would be less than 1 minute a day. What would the user put for this?

I think the options should be added: I never (or rarely) ejaculate, and I ejaculate less than 1 time per week.[/b]

Also I think we should ask the question here: Do you ejaculate within two hours of a PE session?
Yes, Always – At least 95 percent of the time
Most of the time, yes — approximately 75 percent of the time
Sometimes – approximately 50 percent of the time
Rarely — approximately 25 percent of the time
No - — approximately less than 5 percent of the time

Here we should the following questions:

How many caffeinated sodas have you drunk per week, on average, during your periods of active PEing? ____ sodas

How many alcoholic beverages (equivalent to one beer, one glass of wine, or one shot of liquor) have you drunk per week, on average, during your periods of active PEing? ____ alcoholic drinks

How many times have you smoked marijuana per week, on average, during your periods of active PEing? ____ times

I believe these questions, along with your question number four should also have the optional answers of — I never (or rarely) did ____ , and I did ____ less than 1 time per week.

Again, I think we should modify these questions like we did the last percentage questions (which you probably agree).

Also, add questions regarding all the supplements the user has taken. To find this information out we will ask two questions in the beginning of the survey:

1 -What types of exercises the participant has used in the past — allowing us to question the user purtaining to their exercise experience.
2 - what type of supplements the participant has taken during active PE — allowing us to question for certain supplements

Great question.

With this question I think we should add the word approximately – I can’t remember exactly how long I did it for – but I can estimate 1 month.

Also, we should have the option : I started out with a routine much more advanced then the one prescribed at Thunder’s.

Additionally, we should have an example of what the newbie routine is. Some people came to this place with prior PE experience, never looking at the newbie routine.

Again, these are minor modifications. I like the way you broke down the sections – it makes it easy on the user. Read below:

How is the survey going to be taken?
I have been talking to the programmer lately, and he is going to make it so the participants can stop and restart at anytime. This allows participants to take the survey in chunks. Para, the way you broke down the survey into sections makes this task easily attainable — thank you.

I am curious, in your opinion is it better to have blank questions than pre-determined questions? In your opinion, what are the pro’s and con’s of blank questions and pre-determined questions?

I have learned there is only one thing perfect in this world, and only one thing … . ME ;)

Just kidding. I think after we get another version or two of the rough draft finished, we can get a few of the bright minds in here to add their opinions and modifications.

Section III: PE Outcomes

Add the option: I did not measure my erect girth at the base.

This is a good question. However, I am curious, how would we analyze it? Is it just a simple statistic question? Meaning, if 20 percent of the people say yes – we can say “20 percent PEer’s believe their starting measurements would be greater if they could have obtained a full erection at the time.”

At this point there will be a question that will ask the participant if he made gains. If yes, then the participant will be asked these questions:

Add the word approximately to Questions 13 and 14.

I think we should reword question 15. “Lose” is biased. Maybe the participant gained while on a break.

Also, here, or the subdivision before these last three questions we should add the questions XLMangum and I built earlier… (or something along these lines)

Section 3 was really good. Not too many modifications needed.

The next step will be to create an easily readable modified rough draft version.
After that, we can add the rest of the “questions we want answers to.”

I am going to a wedding tomorrow, so I most likely won’t be on until Saturday. If I am lucky I will snag on for an hour or two.

Off to bed I go. I am exhausted (If my writing is becoming hard to read, that is why), and I must get up in 4 hours …