The experimenter's expectancy effect is an important component of the social psychology of the psychological experiment (SPOPE), whose thesis is that conducting or participating in research is a social activity that might be affected subtly by three social or interpersonal factors, namely, demand characteristics, subject effects, and the experimenter's expectancy effects. These artifacts call into question the credibility, generality, and objectivity, respectively, of research data. However, these artifacts may be better known as social psychology of nonexperimental research (SPONE) because they apply only to nonexperimental research.

The SPOPE Argument

Willing to participate and being impressed by the aura of scientific investigation, research participants may do whatever is required of them. This demand characteristics artifact creates credibility issues in the research data. The subject effect artifact questions the ...

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