The Underprovision of Experiments in Political Science

Donald P. Green and Alan S. Gerber

The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 2003, vol. 589, issue 1, 94-112

Abstract: Field experimentation enables researchers to draw unbiased and externally valid causal inferences about social processes. Despite these strengths, field experimentation is seldom used in political science, which relies instead on observational studies and laboratory experiments. This article contends that political scientists underestimate the value of field experimentation and overestimate their ability to draw secure causal inferences from other types of data. After reviewing the history of experimentation in the discipline, the authors discuss the advantages and disadvantages of field experimental methods. They conclude by describing a number of research topics that seem amenable to experimental inquiry.

Date: 2003
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0002716203254763 (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:anname:v:589:y:2003:i:1:p:94-112

DOI: 10.1177/0002716203254763

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().