Comparison of Behavioral Changes Resulting from Human Relations Training Laboratories of Different Lengthsa

Abstract

The present paper reorts a comparative study of enduring behavior changes following human relations training laboratories of three weeks' and two weeks' duration. A behavior change description questionnaire was used eight to ten months after training to elicit descriptions of a subject's postlaboratory behavior changes as seen by the subject himself and seven of his co-workers (including superiors, peers, and subordinates). A matched control sample was obtained and assessed in the same manner.

Two interrelated measures of change were derived from the questionnaires: the "total change score," composed of the total number of different changes mentioned by a subject and his co-workers; and the "verified change score," composed of those behavior changes which are mentioned by two or more persons in a set of descriptions. A set of 17 inductively derived content categories were also used to make a qualitative analysis of the changes.

While both laboratory trained samples differed from the control sample on both measures, they also differed significantly from each other. Both the perceived change score and the verified change score reveal more changes made by the three-week sample. The content category analysis suggests that the three-week laboratory participants made more overt, pro-active changes, as opposed to the more passive, attitudinal changes made by the two-week sample. Analysis of changes by broad occupational groupings shows differences in response to training which interact with the samples studied.

The training designs of the three-week and two-week laboratories are discussed and shown to confound the duration variable. The greater relative emphasis on back-home application of laboratory training in the three-week program is suggested to be a major contributor to the qualitative differences in the kinds of changes made.

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