Online Field Experiments

Studying Social Interactions in Context

Bibliographic Data

ID11326381
AuthorsPaolo Parigi (Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA, corresponding author), Jessica J Santana (0000-0001-6660-5393, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA), K S Cook (0000-0003-0867-5443, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA)
Year2017
Volume80
Issue1
Pages1-19
Publication date2017-03-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueSocial Psychology Quarterly (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0190-2725 • E-ISSN: 1939-8999
PublisherSAGE Publications (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.1177/0190272516680842
OpenAlexW2583151785
LanguageEN
Citations received18
References cited30

Thanks to the Internet and the related availability of “Big Data,” social interactions and their environmental context can now be studied experimentally. In this article, we discuss a methodology that we term the online field experiment to differentiate it from more traditional lab-based experimental designs. We explain how this experimental method can be used to capture theoretically relevant environmental conditions while also maximizing the researcher’s control over the treatment(s) of interest. We argue that this methodology is particularly well suited for social psychology because of its focus on social interactions and the factors that influence the nature and structure of these interactions. We provide one detailed example of an online field experiment used to investigate the impact of the sharing economy on trust behavior. We argue that we are fundamentally living in a new social world in which the Internet mediates a growing number of our social interactions. These highly prevalent forms of social interaction create opportunities for the development of new research designs that allow us to advance our theories of social interaction and social structure with new data sources

Big data · Context (archaeology · Data science · Field (mathematics · Focus (optics · Political science · Social change · Social competence · Social heuristics · Social influence · Social relation · Sociology · The Internet · World Wide Web · Computer Science · Evolutionary Game Theory and Cooperation · Experimental Behavioral Economics Studies · Opinion Dynamics and Social Influence · Psychology · Social Psychology

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