Field experiments are characterized by:

Field experiments are characterized by being conducted in real-life settings, which allows researchers to observe behaviors and interactions in a more natural context compared to lab experiments. This approach provides a more authentic understanding of the social phenomena being studied, as participants are in their usual environments rather than an artificial setting, which may influence their behavior.

Conducting experiments in real-life settings helps to increase the ecological validity of the findings. While the experimentation aspect allows researchers to manipulate certain variables, the natural environment helps in capturing genuine responses and behaviors, making the results potentially more applicable to real-world scenarios. This is a key benefit of field experiments, distinguishing them from laboratory experiments, which typically involve controlled conditions that may not reflect everyday life accurately.

In contrast to this, other options suggest characteristics that do not align with the definition of field experiments, such as artificial settings or purely quantitative data collection.