as participants in experiments run by fellow students and professors at the university. At the start of the term it was additionally explained to these students that to monitor the experiments that were being conducted interviews would be held with some students and they would be asked for their honest opinion of the experiment. One particular study, called ‘Measures of Performance’, lasted two hours and 71 male students signed up for it. This is where Festinger and Carlsmith’s deceptions began. The subjects were told that the experiment lasted just over an hour, but they had to schedule it for two 21
hours, so the university administration were using this as a good opportunity to interview the subjects in the spare time after the experiment. Then, the experiment began, with subjects first having to move spools around a tray for half an hour and then, for the next half hour, putting pegs in a board. Obviously, doing such boring tasks for an hour would give the subjects a negative view of the experiment, which is exactly what Festinger and Carlsmith were counting on. After all, who enjoys putting pegs in a board for half an hour? At this point subjects were informed that there would be two groups in this experiment and they are in Group A. Group B will do exactly the same thing, but before they start a student who is running the experiment will tell subjects how interesting and entertaining the experiment is. That is the group they are really interested in, and the experiment the subject just did is the control group. The subject then waits for the interviewer from