Researchers Were Interested in How People's Perceptions of Others Can

Researchers were interested in how people's perceptions of others can be influenced by knowledge regarding those others' consumption of limited resources. Specifically, they designed a study where participants were asked to imagine that they were responsible for their town's energy supply, which was displayed on a computer screen, and some people were already using too much. Participants were then shown (experimentally manipulated) profiles for all people in town and in each profile it included information about the person's individual consumption rate directly above the average consumption rate in the town. The dependent variable was a scale assessing how likely it was that the participant would be friends with each person-profile. This experiment is most likely a(n) :

A) active role-playing simulation
B) passive role-playing simulation
C) active analogue experiment
D) passive analogue experiment