Distortion and selective disclosure limit data available to program evaluators, producing a
bias that tends to maintain the status quo. Paradoxically, attempts to objectify, regulate,
or depersonalize the production of data only increase the potential for distortion. A
reliance on the data produced by science is not necessarily a solution. Social science
tends to be a self-legitimizing specialty that forces our understanding of social situations
into historically accepted categories and relationships without specifying methods for
testing the validity of these findings. An awareness of status quo tendencies raises prob
lems for evaluators interested in innovation and change.
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