The next questions refer to the situation described below. In an experiment designed to determine whether watching violent scenes on television increases the frequency of aggressive behavior in children, one group of subjects saw a nonviolent cartoon and another group saw a violent cartoon. In the play period that followed the viewing of the cartoons, researchers observed the two groups of children together and counted instances of aggressive behavior. The control group in the experiment is the group that
a) the researchers thought would be the most aggressive
b) performed the larger number of aggressive acts
c) performed the smaller number of aggressive acts
d) watched the violent cartoon
e) watched the nonviolent cartoon