t, the Hawthorne stud-
             ies were undertaken to investigate the effect
             of work conditions on employee productiv-
             ity. The earliest of the six studies, a joint ef-
             fort between Hawthorne researchers and the
             National Research Council of the National
             Academy of Sciences, addressed the effect of
             light intensity. The results of these studies
             showed an unexpected relationship between
             the level of illumination and worker produc-
             tivity. In fact, the test group, which was sub-
             jected to continually reduced lighting,
             showed an increase in productivity up to the
             point where the equipment was barely visi-
             ble. In the final experiment of this stage,
             when experimenters only pretended to in-
             crease and decrease light intensity, workers
             commented that the supposedly brighter
             light was much more pleasant. Researchers
             concluded that uncontrolled factors played a
             much stronger role in productivity than
             This work led to further studies which at-
             tempted to account for the unexpected find-
             ings by controlling other factors rela
             ...