Graduate School of Business, Stanford University.
Perspect Psychol Sci. 2017 May;12(3):454-467. doi: 10.1177/1745691616681645.
We argue that psychologists who conduct experiments with long lags between the manipulation and the outcome measure should pay more attention to behavioral processes that intervene between the manipulation and the outcome measure. Neglect of such processes, we contend, stems from psychology's long tradition of short-lag lab experiments where there is little scope for intervening behavioral processes. Studying process in the lab invariably involves studying psychological processes, but in long-lag field experiments it is important to study causally relevant behavioral processes as well as psychological ones. To illustrate the roles that behavioral processes can play in long-lag experiments we examine field experiments motivated by three policy-relevant goals: prejudice reduction, health promotion, and educational achievement. In each of the experiments discussed we identify various behavioral pathways through which the manipulated psychological state could have produced the observed outcome. We argue that if psychologists conducting long-lag interventions posited a theory of change that linked manipulated psychological states to outcomes via behavioral pathways, the result would be richer theory and more practically useful research. Movement in this direction would also permit more opportunities for productive collaborations between psychologists and other social scientists interested in similar social problems.
我们认为，对于那些在操纵和结果测量之间存在较长时间滞后的实验心理学家来说，他们应该更加关注介于操纵和结果测量之间的行为过程。我们认为，这种对行为过程的忽视源于心理学长期以来一直专注于短时间滞后的实验室实验，而这些实验几乎没有干预行为过程的空间。在实验室中研究过程通常涉及研究心理过程，但在长时间滞后的现场实验中，研究因果相关的行为过程以及心理过程都很重要。为了说明行为过程在长时间滞后实验中可以发挥的作用，我们考察了受三个与政策相关的目标驱动的现场实验：减少偏见、促进健康和提高教育成就。在讨论的每个实验中，我们都确定了各种行为途径，通过这些途径，被操纵的心理状态可能会产生观察到的结果。我们认为，如果进行长时间滞后干预的心理学家提出了一种变革理论，该理论通过行为途径将被操纵的心理状态与结果联系起来，那么结果将是更丰富的理论和更实用的研究。朝着这个方向发展也将为心理学家和其他对类似社会问题感兴趣的社会科学家之间的富有成效的合作提供更多机会。
