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RE: Thanks

*** You do NOT do it by losing control of your own experiment. If your own antics prejudice the results, ***

It's not really about losing control, it's about ensuring that your personal biases and knowledge do not influence the results.

A classic example of this is "psychic" experiments where they found out that subjects were getting the correct answer simply by reading the body language of the experimenter.

But it is also possible that you can do everything right (use all the right buzzwords and even apply them correctly) and still get it wrong. An example of this is that infamous study which "proved" by exhaustive double blind testing that people can't differentiate between SA-CD and DVD-Audio.

Problem was, the researchers didn't take into account that it takes time for someone to get used to the differences. And hearing acuity can be improved with training. An average person would find it difficult to distinguish between MP3 and CD, and yet people can train themselves to hear the differences. The study ignored the fact that there were at least two subjects they tested that were able to spot the differences consistently - they just brushed those subjects aside rather than investigate the reasons why these two can tell the difference and others couldn't.

This shows how powerful experimenter bias is in clouding thinking. The experimenters wanted to believe there was *no* difference, so they deliberately interpreted the results to fit their prejudice (*Most* people can't hear differences, therefore there *are* no differences).

See you at stand 413 - except my ability to distinguish differences is so poor I may need to steal a few sips from you!

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