Research Methods for Studying Groups and Teams

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RUNNING LABORATORY EXPERIMENTS WITH GROUPS

Gwen M. Wittenbaum

MICHIGAN STATE UNIVERSITY

Fledgling scholars who want to understand groups by conducting laboratory experiments will find many sources of information about how to design experiments (e.g., Haslam & McGarty, 2004; Kirk, 1995; Laughlin, this volume; Smith, 2000). Graduate students in social sciences typically learn about experimental design in their research methods courses and benefit from having an advisor or graduate committee assist with their experimental design for a degree-required project. When embarking to conduct the laboratory experiment, however, the fledgling scholar may have few sources of support for how to run it. Graduate students may compare notes with their peers ...