Shedding light on the Hawthorne studies

The Hawthorne Studies on social influences in the workplace have weathered decades of scholarly attack. Hawthorne critics have generally misunderstood or misrepresented the modest ideological and methodological presumptions of this pioneering research, which was intended to generate, not verify, hypotheses. This article reviews the decades of controversy within the historical context of the discipline of organizational behaviour. Original research records, and recent interviews with the actual study participants support the validity and importance of the original research reports.