The Relevance of Laboratory Studies to Practical Situations

TLDR

Laboratory experiments are inherently limited approximations of real‑life situations, selecting only a few variables, altering conditions, and using convenient but often irrelevant dependent measures, which can lead to misleading or unrepresentative results. Consequently, conclusions drawn from laboratory studies should be generalized to practical problems with extreme caution.

Abstract

By their very nature laboratory experiments are at best only rough and approximate models of any real-life situation. First of all the possible independent variables that influence behaviour in any practical situation, a laboratory experiment selects only a. few for test. As a result, hidden or unsuspected interactions in real-life may easily nullify, or even reverse, conclusions arrived at in the laboratory. Second, variables always change when they are brought into the laboratory. Third, the effect of controlling extraneous or irrelevant variables in the laboratory is to increase the precision of an experiment but at the risk of discovering effects so small that they are of no practical importance. Fourth, the dependent variables (or criteria) used in laboratory experiments are variables of convenience. Rarely are they selected for their relevance to some practical situation. Last, the methods used to present variables in the laboratory are sometimes artificial and unrealistic. The safest and most honest conclusion to draw from all these considerations is that one should generalize with extreme caution from the results of laboratory experiments to the solution of practical problems.