A group of 13 experts in cotton insect control were given a series of exams in an attempt to validate the results of an expert system. The expert system, CIC-EM, was developed to assist growers and pest managers with determining the need to apply insecticides. Participating experts were instructed to respond to ca. 600 different crop - pest scenarios and rate their tendency to apply insecticide. Preliminary results suggest that most experts follow similar patterns in making control decisions, but variation does exist. The expert system tended to not spray more often than most of the experts, but the magnitude of the difference between the expert system and the average response for the group was small. Larger differences were observed among the experts. These results suggest that resolution of expert opinion should be an important component of expert system development, and perhaps, cotton insect control recommendations.