EXPERIMENTER EFFECTS Flashcards
What are experimenter effects?
Anyway, in which the experimenter might influence the outcome of an experiment
What is the Hawthorne Effect?
Where the mere presence of a researcher affects the participants performance at a task. This may be due to the feeling of pressure.
What are demand characteristics?
When the participant guesses the aim of the experiment and alters their behaviour to meet or go against the demands of the experiment
What is experimental control?
Methods put in place to prevent confounding variables impacting the environment
- Counterbalancing
- Randomisation
- Double-blind experiment
- Single-blind experiment
What is standardisation?
Keeping the experimental procedure the same for all participants to improve reliability and ensure it can be easily replicated
What is order effect?
Effects that occurred due to the order in which participants experience the conditions. Order effects include fatigue or practice as they may affect the participants performance.
What is counterbalancing?
A method used to overcome the impact of order effect. Where the experiment alternate the order of the conditions for each participant. Having half of the participants due condition A then B and the other half do B then A. This will average out the impact of order effect so it doesn’t
Impact the validity of the results.
What is randomisation?
A method used to overcome the impact of order effects in which the experimental randomly allocate participants to an order of the conditions (counterbalancing but more random, for example flipping a coin for each pps)
What is a double blind experiment?
Where both the participant and the researcher do not know the aim of the study. This controls demand characteristics and experimental effects. This also means that the researcher will interpret the pps behaviour objectively without any bias.
What is a single blind experiment?
The participants are unaware of the true aim of the study. They may be deceived or be completely unaware that they are even being observed. This reduces the chance of demand characteristics.
