Field Experiments And Laboratory Experiment On Education Flashcards
Features of field experiments
Takes place in a subjects natural surrounding and those involved are not aware they they are subjects.
What did the Rosenhan experiment do in 1973
Experiment where researchers presented themself in different mental hospitals claiming to hear voices and were diagnosed as schizophrenia
What happened after the researchers were admitted to the different mental hospitals during the Rosenhan experiment 1973
When in hospital the researchers claimed to not hear voices and acted normally. The hospital staff treated all as if they were ill and none was found. Suggesting that the label of schizophrenia led to staff to treat them rather than the behaviour of the patients.
Evaluation of the Rosenhan experiment in 1973
Shows the value of the field experiment and that they are more natural as they don’t involve lab experiments. However it is harder to have control over variables and harder to identify the causes.
The comparative method
Carried in the mind of the sociologist and is designed to discover the cause and effect relationships. This works by identifying 2 groups with alike aspects except from one variable then comparing the 2 groups to see if one difference has any effect.
Durkheim study of suicide
Suggested that low levels of integration of individuals in social groups caused high rates of suicide.
Durkheim suicide experiment.
Argued that Protestants have a higher suicide rate than Catholicism because they have lower rates of integration. Official statistics supported Durkheim’s prediction.
Evaluation of Durkheim suicide study
This method has three advantages
-Avoids artificiality
-Used to study past events
-Poses no ethical problems such as harming subjects.
What issues do sociologists experiment in education
- teacher expectations
- classroom interaction
- labelling
- pupils’ self concept
- self fullfilling prophecy
Study to investigate teacher expectations.
Study the nature and impact of teacher expectations. Many claim that teachers expectations of different groups have important effects leading to issues such as self fullfilling prophecy
Harvey and slatin experiment of teacher expectations. (1976)
Examined whether teachers had preconceived ideas about pupils of different social classes
What did Harvey and slatin do in the experiment.
Used 96 teacher samples who were shown 18 photos of children from different social backgrounds. The control variable was that the photos were divided into age, gender and ethnicity. The teachers were asked to rate the photos based on parents attitude to education and performance.
Evaluation of the Harvey and slatin experiment on teacher expectations.
Found that working class pupils were less favourable. The teachers based their ratings on the similarities they perceived between children. The study indicates that teachers label children based on social class.
The charkin et al experiment in 1975.
Used a sample on 48 pupils in university who each taught a 10 year old boy. One third were told the boy was intelligent, the other third was told nothing and the last third was told we were poorly motivated.
Evaluation of charkin et al experiment
Found that those with a high expectancy on the boy made more contact and gave out more encouraging body language than the low expectancy group.
The Mason (1973) experiment
Looked at whether positive or negative expectations had a greater effect on
What did the mason experiment consist of
Teachers were given a positive and negative and neutral report on students. The teachers observed a video of the pupils taking a test watching for errors. Asked to predict the pupils end of year attainment.
Evaluation of the mason 1973 experiment.
Found that negative reports had a much greater impact
Ethical problems of laboratory experiments on teacher expectations.
Some experiments use real people including children that raised concern, this sis because vulnerability groups have limited ability to understand what is happening.
Narrow focus of laboratory experiments in teacher expectations.
Experiments only examines one specific aspect of teacher expectations such as body language. This is useful because it allows the researcher to exams variables more thoroughly.
Practical problems on laboratory experiments on teacher expectations.
More problems as schools are complex and there are many variables which are difficult to control and identify.
Field experiments on teacher expectations.
Rosenthal and Jacobson in 1968 illustrates the difficulty of using field experiments to study teacher expectations.
What was the Rosenthal and Jacobson experiment of 1968
Carried out research In a California primary school. Pupils to take an in test and told the teachers that this had enabled the researchers to identify the 20% of pupils who were likely to have a spurt in the next year. However the pupils were chosen at random.
What was the aims of the Rosenthal and Jacobson experiment.
To plant the minds of the teacher a particular set of expectations about their pupils and to secondly see if this had any effect on pupils performance.
Rosenthal and Jacobson evaluation
The spurters were selected at random and the researchers wanted to see if teachers expectations had any influence. 8 months later the pupils retested and the spurters points went up by 4 points better than the average.
Ethical problems of field experiments on teachers expectations.
Children have more rights these days and the legal duty of care that schools have mean that this experiment is less likely to happen now.
Reliability of field experiments on teachers expectations
The study was designed to be easily repeated, however all schools are different making it impossible to create an exact replica.
Validity of field experiment on teacher expectations.
Rosenthal and Jacobson claimed that teachers expectations were passed on through differences in the way they interact with peoples. However, the researcher did not carry out any observation on classroom interaction, so they do not have data to support this claim.
Broader focus on field experiments of teacher expectations.
Rosenthal and Jacobson looked at the whole labelling process from teacher expectations through the effect in pupils rather than examining every element. They said it was also longitudinal which allowed them to identify trends over time.
