Limits and Considerations in Control Groups

Control groups have become an almost required element in trademark surveys. Survey methodology, however, derives from the field of sociology and political science where there was no such concept of 'control' groups. The studies were designed to be descriptive of a phenomenon. As such, the surveys contained no 'controls,' but could still none the less offer useful information. The political polling of today is such an example. Surveys used for intellectual property purposes have been heavily influenced by the field of experimental psychology, from which the concept of the 'control' emanates. The typical understanding of how a control group operates is that one group or cell receives a test stimulus and the other the control stimulus. The control stimulus is similar to the test but absent the alleged infringing aspects. The difference between their results reflects the 'net' confusion level, test minus 'noise.' This definition, however, fails to tell the full story that control groups may not always be needed, and, when needed, may not solve certain aspects of noise or biases merely by their presence.