The laboratory method
In the laboratory method, the researcher uses various forms of elicitation techniques to prompt speakers to produce certain utterances. This method relies on the cooperation of informants. They are asked to imagine communicative situations and to state how they would behave in such situations or how they expect other people to behave in these situations. Thus the informants communicate without their own intrinsic communicative intentions. They behave in “as if” situations. This may be experienced as unnatural and artificial, but it allows the researcher to have greater control over many different variables.
Two main approaches shall be discussed as examples of the laboratory method.