What is the "Hawthorne Effect" and how can social scientists address it?

When the humans being studied know they are being observed or experimented upon, they occasionally alter their normal behavior. This phenomenon is known as the Hawthorne Effect, a term used to describe the observable tendency of some people to exert more effort or perform better on a task if they know they are participating in a research study. Like a crowd responding to a TV camera, the subjects of a social science investigation might want to "assist" or "undermine" the investigator by behaving as they imagine the social scientist might expect (or not expect). We see this in educational research. When a classroom full of students knows their educational performance is being studied, some students, wanting the investigator to think of them as good students, display better classroom behavior than they would ordinarily. Or, wanting the "experiment to work," some students might study harder and try harder on tests than they ordinarily would. Strong critical thinking about gathering reliable social science data requires that the investigator anticipate the possibility that the people being investigated might alter their behavior or their verbal responses simply because they know they are part of a research project. One way that social scientists overcome this risk to the validity of their research is by not telling people what exactly is being studied. In the language of social science methods, this approach is referred to as a blind study because the participants are not aware of the questions that the research team is aiming to answer.