What is the hawthorn effect and the practice effect. Can you give examples of each?

1) "Hawthorn Effect"





By Kendra Van Wagner, About.com


Filed In:





1. Psychology Dictionary


2. %26gt; H Index





Definition: A term referring to the tendency of some people to work harder and perform better when they are participants in an experiment. Individuals may change their behavior due to the attention they are receiving from researchers rather than because of any manipulation of independent variables.





This effect was first discovered and named by researchers at Harvard University who were studying the relationship between productivity and work environment. Researchers conducted these experiments at the Hawthorn Plant of Western Electric and found that productivity increased due to attention from the research team and not because of changes to the experimental variable.





2) Ptactice Effect


Practice effects refer to gains in scores on cognitive tests that occur when a person is retested on the same instrument, or tested more than once on very similar ones. These gains are due to the experience of having taken the test previously; they occur without the examinee being given specific or general feedback on test items, and they do not reflect growth or other improvement on the skills being assessed. Such practice effects denote an aspect of the test itself, a kind of systematic, built-in error that is associated with the specific skills the test measures. These effects relate to the test's psychometric properties, and must therefore be understood well by the test user as a specific aspect of the test's reliability. Retesting occurs fairly commonly in real circumstances for reasons such as mandatory school reevaluations, longitudinal research investigations, unwitting or deliberate duplication by different professionals who are evaluating the same individual, a parent's or teacher's insistence that a child be retested because the test scores imply that the child was not trying, and so forth. A keen understanding of differential practice effects facilitates competent interpretation of test score profiles in those instances in which people are retested on the same or a similar instrument, perhaps several times.





No specific length of time between tests is required to study practice effects; it depends on the generalization sought or needed

What is the hawthorn effect and the practice effect. Can you give examples of each?
Ok, the Hawthorne (with an 'e') effect describes a temporary change to behavior or performance in response to a change in the environmental conditions, with the response being typically an improvement. The term was coined in 1955 by Henry Landsberger when analyzing older experiments from 1924-1932 at the Hawthorne Works (outside Chicago). Landsberger defined the Hawthorne effect as:





a short-term improvement caused by observing worker performance.





Earlier researchers had concluded the short-term improvement was caused by teamwork when workers saw themselves as part of a study group or team. Others have broadened the definition to mean that people's behavior and performance change following any new or increased attention. Hence, the term Hawthorne effect no longer has a specific definition.





In short it means you work better when your boss is watching or when your working in part of a team.





Ok now the Practice effect, it refers to gains in scores on exams that Practice effect refers to gains in scores on exams that occur when a person is retested on the same instrument or tested more than once on very similar ones. These gains are due to the experience of having taken the exam previously; they occur whether or not the examinee was given specific or general feedback on exam items, and they do not reflect growth or other improvement on the skills being assessed.