Lab Experiments

Question 1

who favours lab experiments

Answer 1

Positivists

Question 2

why do positivists favour lab experiments

Answer 2

It achieves their main goal of reliability. It allows them to have careful control over experimental conditions which produces reliable data because it allows other researchers to replicate the experiment. It allows the researcher to identify and measure behaviour patterns quantitatively and to manipulate variables to establish a cause and effect relationship

Question 3

why do positivists not favour lab experiments sometimes

Answer 3

It is often impossible or unethical to control the variables
Their small scale means that results may not be representative or generalisable, positivists sometimes use the comparative method for this reason

Question 4

why do interpretivists reject lab experiments

Answer 4

It fails to achieve their main goal of validity. It is an artificial situation producing unnatural behaviour. Interpretivists favour more naturalistic field experiments, but positivists criticise this method for giving us less control over variables

Question 5

features of lab experiments

Answer 5

Control
Cause and effect

Question 6

Control - Lab Exp

Answer 6

A lab experiment is a controlled experiment, held in an artificial environment in which the scientist can control different variables in order to discover what effect they have. In this way, the scientist can test hypotheses about the cause of a phenomenon.

Question 7

groups the people to be researched are divided into

Answer 7

The experimental group - they are exposed to a variable called the independent variable that the researcher believes may have a particular effect
The control group - they are not exposed to the independent variable - their conditions are kept constant

Question 8

cause and effect

Answer 8

allows us to predict what will happen under the same conditions in the future

Question 9

practical issues

Answer 9

Open systems
Individuals are complex
Studying the past
small samples
Hawthorne Effects - theoretical issues as it threatens validity
The expectancy effect

Question 10

open systems

Answer 10

Keat and Urry argue that lab experiments are only suitable for studying closed systems where the researcher can control and measure all the relevant variables and make precise predictions. However, society is an open system where countless factors are at work in any given situation, interacting with each other in complex ways. This makes it impossible for the researcher even to identify, let alone control, all the relevant variables. This makes lab experiments unsuitable for studying social phenomena.

Question 11

studying the past

Answer 11

Lab experiments cannot be used to study an event in the past, since we cannot control variables that were acting in the past. Nor can we keep people in lab conditions for long time periods so we can study them.

Question 12

small samples

Answer 12

Lab experiments can only study small samples. This makes it difficult to investigate large-scale social phenomena. Small samples also bring the risk that a result that appears to show one variable causing another, may in fact just be a chance correlation between the two.

Question 13

Hawthorne effect

Answer 13

A lab experiment is an artificial environment and any behaviour that occurs in it may also be artificial. If the subject know they’re being experimented on, this may make them act differently, they may try to guess what the researcher wants them to do and act accordingly. This will ruin the experiment.

Question 14

expectancy effect

Answer 14

This is a form of experimental bias. It refers to the fact that what a researcher expects to happen in the experiment can affect its actual outcome. This can occur by the experimenter consciously or unconsciously treating the subjects in a way that influences how they respond and produces the result the experimenter expected.

Question 15

ethical issues

Answer 15

informed consent
harm to subjects
deception

Question 16

informed consent

Answer 16

Sometimes explaining the aim of the experiment beforehand will be self-defeating. In these cases, for the experiment to work, the subjects must be deceived because if they know its true purpose it may reduce the authenticity of the research by creating the Hawthorne Effect.

Question 17

deception

Answer 17

it is wrong to mislead people as to the nature of the experiment as Milgrim did in his study of obedience to authority. Milgram lied to his research participants about the purpose of the research, telling them they were assisting in an experiment on learning, they were ordered by the researcher to administer electric shocks when the learner failed to answer questions correctly. In reality, the purpose of the experiment was to test people’s willingness to obey orders to inflict pain. Young people may be unable to understand what is happening meaning that there are greater problems of deception

Question 18

harm

Answer 18

the experiment can also harm victims

Question 19

theoretical issues

Answer 19

Reliability and hypothesis testing
Representativeness
Internal Validity
Interpretivism and free will

Question 20

Reliability and hypothesis testing

Answer 20

Positivists see reliability as important because it enables us to check the work of other researchers by repeating them. If we can repeat the research and arrive at the same results, we can have more confidence that the original findings are true.

Question 21

reasons why positivists regard lab experiments as highly reliable

Answer 21

The original experimenter can control the conditions and specify the precise steps that were followed in the original experiment, so others can easily repeat these steps to re-run it
It produces quantitative data, so the results of the re-run experiments can be easily compared to the original
It is a very detached and objective method, the researcher merely manipulates the variables and records the results. Their subjective feelings and values have no effect on the conduct of outcome of the experiment

Question 22

why are lab experiments good for hypothesis testing

Answer 22

Lab experiments can isolate and control any variable that is of interest to the researcher, they are also an effective way to test hypotheses and predictions. If we believe a particular variable is the cause of a phenomenon, we simply set up an experiment where the experimental group is exposed to that variable and a control group is not, and then compare the outcomes.

Question 23

representativeness

Answer 23

For positivists, representativeness is important because they aim to make generalisations about how the wider social structures shape individuals behaviour. However, it lacks external validity

Question 24

types of validity affecting lab experiments

Answer 24

Internal and External Validity

Question 25

ways experiments lack external validity

Answer 25

• It can only study small samples, there is a greater risk that they are not a representative cross-section of the population the researcher is interested in.
• Lack of external validity arises out of the high level of control the experimenter has. Control over the conditions in the experiment is valuable because it enables us to establish a particular effect. However, the higher the level of control we have over the experiment, the more unnatural the circumstances this creates - which may not be all true of the world outside the lab.

Question 26

internal validity

Answer 26

Lab experiments may also lack internal validity. Their findings may not even be true for the subjects of the experiment itself, let alone the wider world. One reason for this is the artificiality of the lab environment, this may encourage the Hawthorne effect = invalid results.

Question 27

practical strength of lab exp

Answer 27

Small scale - sociologist would be able to focus on the set group being studied

Question 28

interpretivism and free will

Answer 28

interpretivists argue that human beings are fundamentally different from other phenomena studied by natural scientists. Unlike these objects, we have free will and choice. Our behaviour is not caused by external forces, so it cannot be explained in terms of cause-and-effect statements like positivists believe. Instead, our actions can only be understood in terms of the choices we freely make on the basis of the meanings we give to events, making lab experiments an inappropriate method for studying human beings. It reduces human feelings to mere numbers and cannot study social interactions

Question 29

Harvey and Slatin

Answer 29

Harvey and Slatin examined whether teachers had preconceived ideas about pupils of different social classes. They used a sample of 96 teachers and each teacher was shown 18 photographs of children from different social backgrounds. To control other variables, the photographs were equally divided in terms of gender and ethnicity. The teachers were asked to rate the children on their performance, parental attitudes to education, aspirations and so on. They found that lower-class children were rated less favourably, especially by more experienced teachers, teachers based their ratings on similarities they perceived between the children in the photos and pupils they had taught. This study indicates that teachers label pupils from different social backgrounds and use these labels to pre-judge pupils’ potential.

Question 30

charkin et al

Answer 30

Labels may be passed on to pupils through non-verbal communication. Charkin et al used a sample of 48 university students who each taught a lesson to a ten-year-old boy.
One-third (the high expectancy group) were told that the boy was highly motivated and intelligent
One-third (the low expectancy group) was told that he was poorly motivated with a low IQ
One-third were given no information
Charkin et al videoed the lessons and found that those in the high-expectancy group made more eye contact and gave out more encouraging body language than the low-expectancy group

Question 31

Mason

Answer 31

Mason looked at whether negative or positive expectations had a greater effect. Teachers were given positive, negative or neutral reports on a pupil. The teachers then observed video recordings of the pupil taking a test, watching to see if any errors were made. Finally, they were asked to predict the pupil’s end-of-year attainment. Mason found that the negative reports had a much greater impact than the positive ones on the teacher’s expectations.

Question 32

ethical problems with studies

Answer 32

Lab experiments that do not involve real pupils have fewer ethical problems than those that do. Neither Mason nor Harvey and Slatin used real pupils, so no child suffered any negative effects.
However, Charkin used real pupils and this raises ethical concerns. Young people’s vulnerability and their more limited ability to understand what is happening mean that there are greater problems of deception, lack of informed consent and psychological damage. These ethical concerns are a major reason why lab experiments play only a limited role in educational research.

Question 33

narrow focus - studies

Answer 33

Lav experiments usually only examine one specific aspect of teacher expectations, such as body language. This can be useful because it allows the researcher to isolate and examine this variable more thoroughly. However, this means that teacher expectations are not seen within the wider process of labelling and the SFP. For example, although Charkin identified the existence of positive and negative body language, they did not examine how it might affect pupils’ performance

Question 34

practical problems - studies

Answer 34

Schools are large, complex institutions in which many variables may affect teacher expectations. For example, their expectations may be influenced by a wide range of variables such as class size, streaming, type of school and so on. In practice, it is impossible to identify, let alone control, all the variables that might exert an influence on teachers expectations

Question 35

artificiality - studies

Answer 35

The artificiality of lab experiments may mean that they tell us little about the real world of education. For example, Clarkin used university students rather than teachers. Harvey and Slatin used photographs of pupils rather than real pupils. It is unlikely that university students behave in the same way as experienced teachers and teacher’s expectations are based on more than just pupils’ appearance. For example, behaviour, accent and impressions of parents may all play a part.