Sa. Haslam et C. Mcgarty, A 100 years of certitude? Social psychology, the experimental method and the management of scientific uncertainty, BR J SOC P, 40, 2001, pp. 1-21
For at least 100 years the experimental method has been used to add scienti
fic rigour to the process of conducting social psychological research. More
specifically experiments have been used to reduce methodological uncertain
ty surrounding the causal relationships between variables. In this way the
method has proved particularly useful in demonstrating the impact of social
contextual variables over-and-above individual differences. However, probl
ems with the method have arisen because over time experimentalists have ten
ded (1) to define uncertainty narrowly, (2) to emphasize uncertainty reduct
ion, but (3) to neglect the equally important process of uncertainty creati
on. This has contributed to the normalization of social psychology as a sci
ence but also made the discipline more conservative and circumscribed. It i
s argued that experimentalists need to address broader metatheoretical and
political uncertainties in order to rediscover the experiment's potency as
a tool of revolutionary and progressive science.