experimental group

American  

noun

1. (in an experiment or clinical trial) a group of subjects who are exposed to the variable under study.

   a lower infection rate in the experimental group that received the vaccine.

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Etymology

Origin of experimental group

First recorded in 1845–50

Compare meaning

How does experimental-group compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:

• control group vs. experimental group

Example Sentences

Animals in the experimental group had about 20 times as much copper in their feces as animals in the control group, and after they stopped receiving copper their levels of the metal returned to baseline.

From Science Daily • Apr. 17, 2024

In a second experimental group, the slant was reversed toward false positives.

From Scientific American • Oct. 26, 2023

And in mentor self-assessment, the experimental group members were twice as likely to report that their racial identity matters to their mentoring relationships, compared with the control group.

From Science Magazine • May 23, 2023

A “high-dose” experimental group was asked to eat twice as many prunes.

From Seattle Times • Jan. 25, 2023

He was one of the most brilliant geneticists of Earth, and came to Mars with an experimental group that was to try to develop a human type that could live more comfortably under Martian conditions.

From Rebels of the Red Planet by Fontenay, Charles Louis