What role do confederates play in experiments?

Confederates play a crucial role in experiments by acting as individuals who are instructed to behave in a specific way to facilitate the research. Their behavior is orchestrated to help researchers investigate particular hypotheses or observe how real participants react to social situations or stimuli.

For instance, in studies examining conformity, confederates may provide incorrect answers to a question to see if naive participants will conform to the group. This controlled manipulation allows researchers to draw conclusions about social behavior, influence, and group dynamics.

The effectiveness of confederates lies in their ability to blend in with the real subjects, often ensuring that the participants are unaware that they are part of a controlled experimental setup. By behaving according to the instructions they receive, confederates can significantly impact the data collected and the overall findings of the research study.