The Observer's Paradox

"If you've ever taken a sociology course, you’ve probably heard about the Hawthorne Study, which was conducted at a Western Electric manufacturing plant during the late 1920s and early 1930s. The manufacturer hired a business professor to see whether worker efficiency would improve if the plant’s lighting was brightened. Long story short, productivity increased, but not because of anything to do with the lights. Instead, workers elevated their output because they knew they were being watched and this alone altered their behaviors. In other words, the mere fact of observation itself triggered changes in the subjects’ habits, a/k/a the "Observer’s Paradox.""

Read the entire (interesting) article here: FrugalFringe.com

------- [Photo by Chase Elliott Clark]