Explore Data with AI – ChatGPT

Researchers can explore their Transana data with Artificial Intelligence (AI). One tool for this is OpenAI’s ChatGPT tool.

This page demonstrates first how to obtain an OpenAI API Key to get started, and then shows how to explore your Transana data with ChatGPT.

Get an OpenAI API Key

Before you can use ChatGPT within Transana, you must obtain an OpenAI API Key. This is NOT the same as having a ChatGPT account.

This key identifies your OpenAI ChatGPT user account, which is used by OpenAI for billing purposes. You only need to do this once, as Transana will remember your API Key after the first time you use it. If you haven’t added your OpenAI API Key to Transana, expand the section below to see a video demonstrating how to get the API Key you need.

How To Get an OpenAI API Key (video)

Explore Transana Data with AI – ChatGPT

Transana allows researchers to select data and craft AI Prompts to explore their data. The following ScreenCast demonstrates this process with a Transcript.

Further details

Select Data to get started

To identify the data you want to explore using AI in Transana, select a Document, a PDF Document, a Transcript, a Collection, a Quote, a PDF Quote, a Clip, or a Snapshot in the Database Tree.

Library – AI tools limit the amount of information they can import and process. Transana does not provide a way to submit an entire Library’s worth of information for AI exploration at one time. Instead, explore your Documents, PDF Documents, and Episode Transcripts individually.
Document – To submit an entire document to AI, right-click a Document and select the Explore Document with AI option. You can also highlight a portion of an open document and press the “Explore with AI” button in the Document Toolbar to explore a selected section of the larger document. Images embedded within the document are not included in the data sent to the AI tool.
PDF Document – To submit the text portion of a PDF document to AI, right-click a PDF Document and select the Explore Document with AI option. PDF document formatting and Images embedded within the PDF document are not included in the data sent to the AI tool. Only PDF document text, in the order determined by the PDF document file, is submitted for AI exploration.
Episode (Media data) = Media data, audio and video files, are not submitted to AI. AI is currently much better, faster, and more accurate when working with text than with media-based data. To explore media data, create a transcript incorporating all aspects of the media file you want included in the AI exploration, then submit that transcript. (Remember, transcripts are not limited to the verbal layer of your media data. They can include a wide variety of descriptions of non-verbal information as well.)
Transcript – To submit an entire transcript for AI exploration, right-click a Transcript and select the Explore Transcript with AI option. You can also highlight a portion of an open transcript and press the “Explore with AI” button in the Document Toolbar to explore a selected section of the larger transcript. Images embedded within the transcript are not included in the data sent to the AI tool.
Collection – If you select a Collection for exploration with ChatGPT, the data sent to the AI tool will include text from Quotes, PDF Quotes, and Clips contained in the Collection, Still images embedded in Quotes and Clips are not include, nor are Snapshots or PDF Snapshots. You will have the option to limit AI Exploration to just the current Collection or to include all items in all Nested Collections
Quote – If you choose to explore a Quote with AI, remember that your prompt should fit the size of your data. Don’t ask for an analysis of themes from a quote that’s only a sentence or two long. The longer your quote, the more complex your prompts can be.
PDF Quote – When you right-click a PDF Quote and choose “Explore Quote with AI,” Transana will send the text associated with that PDF Quote. No image or formatting information is submitted.
Clip – If you choose to explore a Clip with AI, remember that your prompt should fit the size of your data. Don’t ask for an analysis of themes from a clip that’s only a sentence or two long. The longer your clip, the more complex your prompts can be.
Snapshot – If you choose to explore a Snapshot with AI, Transana sends the entire source image file, not just the visible portion you may have selected by changing the Snapshot Window. Coding Shapes are not included in the data sent for AI exploration.
PDF Snapshot – PDF Snapshots cannot be explored with AI from within Transana at this time.

AI Confidentiality Notice

You should not use ChatGPT with confidential or human-subjects sensitive data. Please check with the Institutional review board (IRB) or Ethics Board overseeing your research before using this tool.

The first page of Transana’s tool for AI exploration of data lays out the tool’s terms. It is the researcher’s responsibility to evaluate whether it is appropriate to use this tool given any confidentiality or privacy issues that may apply to your data. If you can accept the terms of use, check the box agreeing to those terms. If you cannot aftee to these terms, do not use AI to explore your data.

AI Prompt and Account Settings

The next page handles preparing for AI exploration. There are three tabs on this page. When all three tabs are set, press the Next button to process the AI prompt defined on the AI Prompt tab with the data defined on the Data tab.

The AI Prompt Tab

The AI Prompt Tab defines the prompt to be sent to the AI Tool. It allows you to create a Prompts Library, adding, editing, and deleting prompts. Transana provides a few relatively simple default prompts, which differ slightly depending on the type of data being explored and which you can edit.

You can also edit your AI prompt outside of the Library, customizing it for a single AI query.

When you are exploring items in a Collection, you can select whether you want to include items in Nested Collections.

The Data Tab

It’s always a good idea to check the Data tab so ensure that the data that is sent to the AI tool is what you expect.

Please note that Transana does not mix text and still image data. Images embedded in Documents, Transcripts, Quotes, and Clips are not included in the data sent for AI exploration. For PDF Documents and PDF Quotes, only the text extracted from the PDF is included. Explore with AI does not support PDF Snapshots. When exploring Collections, Snapshots are not included in the data assembled for AI exploration.

The Settings Tab

The Settings tab allows you to enter your OpenAI API Key, which connects Transana to your OpenAI account so that OpenAI can manage billing for your queries in ChatGPT. Please note that an OpenAI API Key is NOT the same thing as a ChatGPT user account.

You can also select from several different ChatGPT models on this page. Please see the OpenAI and ChatGPT web sites for more information on different ChatGPT models and their associated costs.

Information on the Settings tab is stored as part of your Transana configuration data. You will only need to enter this data once.

AI Results

The final page of the AI Exploration page shows the results of the AI query.

It is vital that researchers approach AI results with a healthy sense of skepticism. These results sometimes provide interesting ideas and hypotheses, but other times present hallucinations and factual inaccuracies, usually stated confidentially, It is the researcher’s responsibility to review such results for accuracy.

Because of this, Transana presents AI results for review and possible editing and correction. If the AI result is useful or interesting, Transana can save it as a Note attached to the data item selected originally for AI Exploration.

Finally, you can convert this note to a Transana Document. This breaks the association with the original triggering data item, but Documents can be quoted, coded, categorized, and further explored with AI within Transana.