Laboratory Experiment - GCSE Psychology Definition

A laboratory experiment is a type of study conducted in a controlled environment, where researchers can carefully manage all the conditions.

In these experiments, researchers test how changing one thing (the independent variable) affects something else (the dependent variable). This is done to understand how different factors might influence people's thoughts or behaviours. For example, if you wanted to see how noise affects concentration, you would change the noise level in the lab and see how it impacts the ability to complete a task.

Laboratory experiments are important in psychology because they help researchers make sure their findings are accurate and reliable by keeping everything else the same except the variable being tested.