ABSTRACT
The famous “Hawthorne effect” experiments, named for the Chicago area Hawthorne works of Western Electric Company where they were conducted, suggested beneficial effects on employee's work efficiency when there was an experimental change in the work environment. The authors of the report on this research (Roethlisberger & Dickson, 1939) found indications that almost any change led to increased work output, regardless of whether it could be interpreted as inherently helpful or pleasant. For example, in the so-called Illumination Studies of that series, decreasing room lighting from 10-foot candles in a control group to as low as 1-foot candle in an experimental group (or to .06-foot candles—like moonlight in an informal experiment) proved favorable! In another part of this series, the Relay Assembly Test Room Study, taking over a year to conduct, several variables were manipulated: the basis for determining a worker's wages, the length of the work day or work week, the length and timing of rest periods, and whether or not the employer provided lunch or something to drink. Productivity increased with most changes and did not drop when there was a change back to the original full work schedules without breaks or free lunches.
