Field Experiment

10 Key excerpts on "Field Experiment"

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  Media Violence and its Effect on Aggression

  Assessing the Scientific Evidence

  • Jonathan Freedman(Author)
  • 2017(Publication Date)
  • University of Toronto Press

    (Publisher)

  Field Experiments Experiments conducted in psychology laboratories have various weak-nesses, which I have already discussed. Though there is disagreement about the importance of these problems, I believe there is general agreement about the value of experiments done in more natural set-tings, sometimes called Field Experiments. It should be noted that the distinction between laboratory and 'field' is somewhat arbitrary. My own feeling is that to qualify as a Field Experiment, the research should be more natural than lab research in as many ways as possible. Show-ing films in class or in the cottages where the subjects live is quite natural; taking them from class to another room in the school for the purpose of showing them films is less natural, unless this happens often at the school; taking them from class to a different building is less natural still, again unless this happens regularly. In other words, in terms of the independent variable in this research (exposure to pro-grams), studies in which subjects are exposed in their own homes or classes, or in settings in which they expect to watch programs, qualify as Field Experiments. In terms of the dependent variable (aggressive or criminal behaviour, or prosocial behaviour), observing this in school playgrounds or the equivalent, or in natural settings of any kind, quali-fies as field observation. In deciding which studies to include in this section I have generally accepted the authors' own descriptions of their work - if they think it is a Field Experiment, I have treated it as one. Field Experiments have several advantages over laboratory experi-ments. First, because they are more natural than laboratory experi-ments, they avoid some of the problems of experimenter demand. When someone is brought into a psychology laboratory and shown a film, it is reasonable for the person to wonder why that film was 5 86 Media Violence and Its Effect on Aggression chosen.

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  Encyclopedia of Educational Psychology

  • Neil J. Salkind(Author)
  • 2008(Publication Date)
  • SAGE Publications, Inc

    (Publisher)

  In each case, Field Experimentation involves the random assignment of students, classrooms, or schools to treatment and con-trol conditions. The primary purpose of experimentation is to iso-late causal relationships. Random assignment ensures that exposure to the intervention bears no systematic relationship to background factors, such as students’ home environment or peer influences. Field settings enable the researcher to draw causal inferences under naturalistic conditions, which enhances the external validity of the results. Field Experiments strive to address four aspects of external validity: (1) How closely does the intervention resemble what will be deployed in other settings, for instance, as the result of a new policy initiative? (2) To what extent was the experimental stimulus delivered in a context that resembles the setting within which the intervention is likely to be deployed in the future? (3) How closely do the subjects in the experiment resemble those who are likely to be presented with the intervention? (4) How closely do the outcome measures resemble 400 Field Experiments the outcomes of most interest from a policy or theo-retical perspective? The ideal Field Experiment is one that is conducted as unobtrusively as possible, using subjects and interventions that allow for generaliza-tion and outcome measures that meaningfully gauge the short-and long-term effects of the intervention. Field Experimentation is especially useful in educa-tional environments where the intervention and setting interact in complex ways. Here, the advantages over laboratory experimentation or observational research are clear. For example, to test the influence of class size on student performance, researchers in a labora-tory study might divide subjects into different sized groups for an afternoon to see how quickly the sub-jects learn a new skill, such as long division.

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  Research Methods For The Behavioural Sciences

  • Frederick J Gravetter; Lori-Ann B. Forzano; Tim Rakow, Frederick Gravetter, Frederick Gravetter, Lori-Ann Forzano, Tim Rakow(Authors)
  • 2021(Publication Date)
  • Cengage Learning EMEA

    (Publisher)

  Many such studies are true experiments, examining manipulations such as the effect of varying the size of the jury, or changing the order in which witness statements are presented (Devine et al., 2001). It would be hard to examine such features in a systematic way in actual jury trials. Therefore, these mock jury simulation studies represent a valuable opportunity to test cause-and-effect explanations for the decisions that juries make, or the ones that they would make if courts were to change their procedures. Field studies A simulation experiment can be viewed as an effort to bring the real world into the laboratory to increase the external validity of experimental results. An alternative procedure that seeks the same goal is to take the laboratory into the real world. Research studies conducted in a real-world environ- ment are called field studies, and researchers often speak of ‘going into the field’ as a euphemism for taking research outside the laboratory. Field settings were discussed briefly in Chapters 3 and 6 and are detailed here. DEFINITION Field study is research conducted in a place that the participant or subject perceives as a natural environment. Although it can be difficult to maintain the necessary control of a true experiment in a field study, it is possible to conduct field study experiments. Many of the more famous field study experiments involve the investigation of helping behaviour or ‘bystander apathy’ in emergency situations. In these studies, the researchers create an emergency situation, then manipulate variables within the emergency and observe bystander responses (Hornstein, Fisch & Holmes, 1968; Piliavin & Piliavin, 1972; Piliavin, Rodin & Piliavin, 1969). Not all studies conducted in the field are experiments. For example, observational research is often conducted in a field setting. Copyright 2021 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part.

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  New Advances in Experimental Research on Corruption

  • Danila Serra, Leonard Wantchekon, Danila Serra, Leonard Wantchekon, R. Mark Isaac, Douglas A. Norton(Authors)
  • 2012(Publication Date)
  • Emerald Group Publishing Limited

    (Publisher)

  Instead, we believe that lab and Field Experiments should be considered as complements, each with their specific advantages and possible limitations (e.g., control and ease of replication versus realism and unobtrusiveness). Furthermore, we are not arguing that to be relevant lab experiments necessarily need to be fully replicable in the field. In particular, like, e.g., Camerer (2011) , we believe that while it is necessary to establish the external validity of experiments that aimed to inform real world policies, the problem of external validity may be considered irrelevant for experiments designed to test theories. Finally, it should be noted that the problem of external validity is not specific to lab experiments. As argued by, e.g., Falk and Heckman (2009) or Kessler and Vesterlund (2011) , similar concerns should be raised about the generalizability of any empirical results obtained from the analysis of data collected in a specific context. In other words, the question of external validity applies not only to lab experiments but also to Field Experiments and even empirical studies conducted with nonexperimental data. Our Methodological Approach We propose an approach essentially consisting in evaluating the robustness of experimental results to the degree of field context incorporated in the game played by subjects. In other words, we proposed to verify the extent to which experimental results remain unchanged when field context is grad-ually introduced in the conduct of the experiment. To do so, we start from the six factors proposed by Harrison and List (2004) to determine the field context of an experiment: the nature of the subject pool, the nature of the information that the subjects bring to the task, the nature of the commodity, the nature of the task or trading rules applied, the nature of the stakes, and the nature of the environment that the subject operates in.

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  The Practical Researcher

  A Student Guide to Conducting Psychological Research

  • Dana S. Dunn(Author)
  • 2012(Publication Date)
  • Wiley-Blackwell

    (Publisher)

  There is no literal field or place of inquiry; any nonlaboratory situation that lacks these traditional qualities to varying degrees, including offices, clinics, corporations, and hospitals, qualifies as “the field.” Indeed, one could make the argument that there is no explicit field setting per se, only different settings with differing features of interest. A substitute term that has gained usage is naturalistic research, which is somewhat passive and noninterventionist. Field research, like much applied research, can be active and intervention-oriented; therefore my preference is to opt for the familiar term “field research.” Critical readers may point out that applied research could easily be a subset of field research, and I would agree that this is generally true. Hedrick, Bickman, and Rog (1993, p.1), for example, have explicitly stated that it is important to acknowledge that “the environment of applied research differs substantially from basic research.” In the main, that statement is true, and it is in keeping with the orientation to field research just outlined. Some applied areas of psychology, however, such as industrial/organizational psychology and educational psychology, do rely on a mix of lab and field research in the course of building and testing theories. To acknowledge this reality, my admittedly 212 Chapter 7: Applied Research and Field Research: Nonexperimental Approaches Laboratory settings Field settings increasing decreasing decreasing increasing control generalizability Internal validity External validity FIGURE 7.1 The trade-off continuum idiosyncratic solution has been to treat applied and field research as largely separate from the traditional experimental approach espoused in chapter 6.

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  Inquiry and Decision (Routledge Revivals)

  • John O'Shaughnessy(Author)
  • 2014(Publication Date)
  • Taylor & Francis

    (Publisher)

  This is not to suggest that these new half-truths serve no purpose. On the contrary they can stimulate the search for new courses of action. The real objection lies in treating them as having any particular scientific merit. However, the popular fallacies are as common among management as in the population at large: the appeal to tradition in saying it is tried and, therefore, true; damning the source of an idea instead of judging the idea itself; appeal to authority that is not an expert witness as sufficient in itself; attacking the man and not the argument (‘We all know he’s ambitious’); the cultural fallacy (‘hardly British’); and so on.

  Field ExperimentS, FIELD STUDIES AND NATURAL EXPERIMENTS

  We have discussed experimentation both in the laboratory and in the field. In general, more control can be exercised within the laboratory, so that testing relationships is easier though the situation is artificial and may be far removed from everyday life. The laboratory experiment may fabricate situations which do not appear in real life, i.e. their external validity is often in question. Thus attitudes may be easy to change in a laboratory situation, but difficult elsewhere. Although in a Field Experiment the researcher seeks to manipulate and control, there is usually some contamination of his results as less control is possible. Field Experiments are often used as a follow-up to laboratory experiments to test their significance in the real world. For example, there have been Field Experiments in which supervisory behaviour was manipulated to gauge the effect on labour productivity. They must be distinguished from natural experiments and field studies.

  In the natural experiment, changes are not initiated by the researcher but by others; there is generally no control group and the researcher seeks to establish relationships while observing the process. Establishing such relationships between dependent and independent variables generally requires statistical techniques. Karl Pearson was the first to develop a measure for the relationship between two variables known as the ‘correlation coefficient’. There is also a rank ‘correlation coefficient’ which is a measure of association between two rank variables after the variables have been ranked in ascending or descending order of value. Of increasing importance is multiple regression which is the relationship between a dependent variable and a set of independent variables.

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  Essentials of Social Psychology

  An Indian Perspective

  • Shubhra Mangal, Shashi Kumar Mangal, Shashi Mangal(Authors)
  • 2022(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  In this way, it is but natural for the researchers in social psychology to look after other methods of investigation that may be helpful in overcoming the problem of external validity with the research findings of their studies. The methods like systematic or naturalistic observation and survey may serve their purpose well in this connection. Let us try to have a look into the nature and applicability of these methods one by one.

  To Sum Up

  Experimental method is the most favored method of investigation employed by the social psychologists all over the globe for the study of the social behavior of people. Here the researchers get engaged in experimental work either in the laboratory setting or in the field setting of the social environment by following all the norms of performing scientific experimentation – observation of the aspect of a social behavior under investigation in quite systematic and careful ways under the needed controlled conditions with the aim of establishing a possible cause and effect relationship between the independent and dependent variables of the study.

  Independent variable is a type of variable that stands for variation (assigning different values by the experimenter) for studying its effect on the dependent variable by holding all other variables, named as intervening variables constant or nullified. This task of eliminating the effects of all the intervening variables for studying the cause and effect relationship between independent and dependent variables in the most valid (truthful) way helps much in establishing internal validity of a research finding. It can be well performed through the random assignment of the subjects of the study to varying conditions of independent variable. The task of random assignment may be well carried out by using a lottery system, tossing of the coin or making use of the random number table.

  Now in terms of validity – accuracy and truthfulness of the research findings of the experimental study – we may say that it can be termed to possess the required internal validity to the extent of the proper identification and controlling of all the possible intervening variables. Regarding the external validity of the experimental studies, i.e., application of the results of the study to a similar situation outside the experimental setup, we may find that findings of the experimental studies are likely to suffer badly in terms of the lack of their external validity.

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  Psychology

  Modules for Active Learning

  • Dennis Coon, John Mitterer, Tanya Martini, , Dennis Coon, John Mitterer, Tanya Martini, (Authors)
  • 2021(Publication Date)
  • Cengage Learning EMEA

    (Publisher)

  The experimental method allows the careful control of con-ditions to bring cause-and-effect relationships into sharp focus (Stangor, 2015). Hence, it is generally accepted as the Experiment A study in which the investigator manipulates at least one variable while measuring at least one other variable. Like Chan, we all conduct little experiments to detect cause-and-effect connections. In a more formal way, that is exactly what psychologists do when they want to understand why we act the way we do. Let’s see why. Copyright 2022 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part. Due to electronic rights, some third party content may be suppressed from the eBook and/or eChapter(s). Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it. PSYCHOLOGY MODULES FOR ACTIVE LEARNING 38 most powerful scientific research tool. To perform an ex-periment, you would do the following: 1. Directly vary a condition that you think might affect behavior. 2. Create two or more groups of participants. These groups should be alike in all ways except the condition you are varying. Usually, one group serves as a control group with which the other groups are compared. 3. Record whether varying the condition has any effect on behavior. Suppose that Chan just happened to be a psychologist who wanted to find out if using smart glasses while driving af-fects the likelihood of having an accident. First, he would form two groups of people. Then he could give the members of one group a test of driving ability while using their smart glasses. The second group would take the same test without using smart glasses. By comparing the average driving abil-ity scores for the two groups, he could tell if the use of smart glasses affects driving ability.

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  Ethical Issues in Psychology

  • Philip Banyard, Cara Flanagan(Authors)
  • 2013(Publication Date)
  • Routledge

    (Publisher)

  For example, Ainsworth's Strange Situation (described on p. 25) involved recording infant behaviors in a very prescribed environment – the research room was a limited space (a 9 × 9 foot square) in order to prevent infants from wandering off. The space was divided into 16 smaller squares to help in recording the infant's movement. Bandura's well-known Bobo doll studies are another example of a controlled observation conducted in a laboratory – actually, an experiment that used controlled observation to measure the dependent variable if we want to be picky. KEY TERMS Laboratory A specially constructed environment where conditions can be carefully controlled. It is also used for observational studies such as a study of sleep patterns. Experiment A research method to investigate causal relationships by observing the effect of an independent variable on the dependent variable. Controlled observation A form of investigation in which behavior is observed but under controlled conditions, as opposed to a naturalistic observation. Dependent variable (DV) depends in some way on the independent variable (IV). The DV is measured in some way to assess the effects of the IV. Field study Any study that is conducted outside a laboratory (i.e. not in a specially designed environment). This includes Field Experiments, naturalistic observations and case studies. The argument is that merely placing a study in a laboratory does not make it unethical. Laboratories simply increase our ability to control variables, which is a necessary part of good research. Equally, a study using an experimental technique is not unethical because it is an experiment – what we want to focus on are the particular features in any study that raise ethical concerns. Field studies Some field studies are experiments (such as Bickman's Field Experiment about obedience to authority, described on p

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  Laboratory Experiments in the Social Sciences

  • Murray Webster, Jane Sell(Authors)
  • 2007(Publication Date)
  • Academic Press

    (Publisher)

  In all cases, correct inference is governed by probability theory and the statistical power associated with the hypothesis test. Although critics assert that experimental findings do not directly generalize to other settings, only a few researchers have actually taken the time to check. For instance, Dipboye and Flanagan (1979) examined the content of empiri-cal articles from major psychological and organizational journals over several years to see if field research is broader than the typical laboratory study. Contrary to popular belief that field research is more representative, they Logical and Philosophical Foundations of Experimental Research 83 10 In fact, the statistical “F-test” which accompanies modern ANOVA models is named in honor of Fisher. found studies in the field to be just as narrow as those in the laboratory in terms of the subjects, behaviors, and situations under investigation. More directly, Locke (1980) examined research findings from industrial organizational psychology, organizational behavior, and human resource man-agement. These are fertile testing grounds because the prevailing theories in these areas (1) are heavily informed by laboratory research, and (2) ultimately guide working conditions in businesses and organizational environments. The question is whether or not the laboratory findings reproduce themselves in the business world. It turns out they do. Time and again Locke and col-leagues found remarkable consistency between the field and the lab. Locke writes, “Both college students and employees appear to respond similarly to goals, feedback, incentives, participation, and so forth, perhaps because the similarities among these subjects (such as in values) are more crucial than their differences” (1986, p. 6). Thus, despite the prevalence of the claim, the data suggest that many laboratory findings generalize to field settings.

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