Research Methods Exam 2 chapters 9-13
RESEARCH STUDY 12.1: Dr. Singh was interested in the way people recognize objects as members of categories. For example, what makes us recognize a dog as being a dog and not a cat? More specifically, she was curious as to whether people think about categories in a more complex way if they contemplate an "opposite" category first. For example, does a person think differently about the category of "southern" if they first think about the category of "northern"? She was also curious as to whether people categorize differently if they are shown examples of those categories (e.g., looking at pictures of different animals) compared with generating those examples themselves (e.g., drawing pictures of different animals). Dr. Singh has four groups of participants (with 30 people in each group). In Group A, participants were told to cut out pictures of dogs and cats from magazines. In Group B, participants were told to cut out pictures of just dogs from magazines. In Group C, participants were told to draw pictures of cats and dogs. In Group D, participants were told to draw pictures of just dogs. After doing this for 30 minutes, participants in all groups were asked to list the attributes that define the "dog" category. Having a higher number of attributes listed was considered to be an indication of thinking about the category in a more complex way. The results of her study are below. How many participant variables exist in Dr. Singh's study? a. 1 b. 4 c. 0 d. 2 In graphing the results of her study, which of the following would be true for Dr. Singh (look back at data) Dr. Singh will need to examine how many two-way interactions?
1. c. 0 2. c. Dr. Singh would see a difference in differences for one variable but not the other variable. (?) 3. a. 3
**1. RESEARCH STUDY 11.1: In previous studies, Dr. Hamid has established that finding meaning in one's everyday work activities can lead to greater success in the workplace (e.g., productivity, creativity). He is curious as to whether this can happen in the college classroom. Specifically, he is curious whether finding meaning in one's classroom experience can lead to greater academic performance. In the spring semester, he has his teaching assistant randomly assign half the class to write a paragraph each class period about how the material has meaning for their lives (meaning group). The other half writes a paragraph about what they did to prepare for class (preparation group). He does not know which of his students are writing which paragraph, and the students are not aware they are responding to different writing assignments. To measure academic performance, he gives the students a midterm essay exam and a final exam. Dr. Hamid likely designed his study so that neither he nor his students knew which group they were in to address which of the following? a. attrition b. maturation c. placebo effects d. demand characteristics
1. d. demand characteristics
2. Imagine that in Dr. Hamid's study, he notes that all of the students do extremely well on the midterm exam. When he looks at the results of the final exam, he notices that all the students' exam scores went down. Given this information, which of the following threats might be present in his study? a. attrition b. regression c. observer bias d. maturation
2. b. regression
3. The study described above is an example of which of the following? a. a double-blind study b. a one-group, pretest/posttest design c. observer bias d. a null effect
3. a double-blind study
Which of the following CANNOT typically be applied to a small- N experiment? a. inferential statistics b. manipulation of variables c. experimental control d. replication
a. inferential statistics
Which popular media headline does NOT suggest that a multiple regression has been used? a. "Dog ownership decreases stress." b."The link between traumatic experience and the development of anxiety symptoms existed even when controlling for the effect of parental anxiety." c."After correcting for several factors that affect memory, including intelligence, researchers found that people who read more frequently remember 12% more about a crime scene than those who don't read frequently." d."After taking into account job experience, people who are happier with their jobs report greater productivity."
a. "Dog ownership decreases stress."
RESEARCH STUDY 13.3: Dr. Anderson is a nutritionist who helps clients lose weight prior to surgery. She is working with W. J., a male client who is planning on undergoing a heart transplant. He currently eats more than 3,500 calories a day and has been asked by his doctor to cut the number of calories to about 1,800 (400 for breakfast, 600 for lunch, and 800 for dinner). She is curious as to whether a food journal will help W. J. reduce the number of calories he eats. A food journal is used to record everything a person eats to help patients be more aware of what they're eating. W. J.'s partner also recorded the food he consumed at each meal to have complete data before introducing the journal. Dr. Anderson decides to phase in the food journal gradually, initially having W. J. record only what he ate at breakfast during the first three days after baseline (days 4-6). During days 7-9, the journal is used at lunch, too, and during days 10-12, it also is used during dinner. The data for Dr. Anderson's study are below. In interrogating the construct validity of Dr. Anderson's study, which of the following might be asked? a. How accurate was W. J.'s partner in her calculation of the calories consumed at each meal? b. Was Dr. Anderson qualified to analyze the data? c. By what margin did W. J.'s calorie intake improve? d. Was the number of calories consumed by W. J. going to decrease before surgery anyway?
a. How accurate was W. J.'s partner in her calculation of the calories consumed at each meal?
Davonte conducts a study on numerical reasoning in two-year-olds. He wants to know whether showing them an educational YouTube video will help them improve their counting abilities. For his dependent variable, he asks each child to count to 100. He finds no change from pretest to posttest and discovers most children couldn't count past 10. This is an example of a. a floor effect. b. a noise effect. c. a ceiling effect. d. a maturation effect.
a. a floor effect.
RESEARCH STUDY 11.2: Dr. Bloedorn is a health psychologist who researches nutrition. She is curious as to whether a new drink additive will help people consume fewer calories during a meal. The drink additive is a white, odorless, tasteless powder that a person can add to any drink. She collects a random sample of 63 overweight students on campus and measures the calories they eat during lunch using a bomb calorimeter. She then gives this additive to the same 63 participants to use at dinner and measures how many calories they eat (again using the bomb calorimeter). Imagine that Dr. Bloedorn finds no difference between the calories consumed with the drink additive and without. This is known as a. a null effect. b. a maturation effect. c. observer bias. d. the placebo effect.
a. a null effect.
***Dr. Biswas designs a study comparing the effects of mindfulness training to cognitive training on flexible thinking. In designing this study, what would be an appropriate manipulation check? a. adding a third group that receives flexibility training b. testing that the flexible thinking task is hard enough to show group differences c. measuring heart rate to ensure that mindfulness has a calming effect d. ensuring that no participants had prior experience with mindfulness training
a. adding a third group that receives flexibility training
The number of main effects that need to be examined is ________ the number of independent variables a. equal to b. more important than c. independent of d. unrelated to
a. equal to
RESEARCH STUDY 13.1: Dr. Ba is interested in whether joining a fraternity/sorority causes people to become more concerned about their attractiveness. She recruits a group of 55 freshmen (25 men, 30 women) who are planning to go through fraternity/sorority recruitment on her campus. After they join, she gives them a measure of attractiveness concern (the Body Concern Scale). In addition to measuring the Body Concern of the participants who joined a fraternity/sorority both immediately before and immediately after they join, Dr. Ba measures them for the three weeks before and the three weeks after. This type of design is known as a(n) a. interrupted time-series design. b. nonequivalent groups interrupted time-series design. c. multiple-baseline design. d. nonequivalent control group design.
a. interrupted time-series design.
Researchers conducting an experiment can ensure temporal precedence by doing which of the following? a. manipulating the cause before measuring the effect b. running a manipulation check c. having a control group d. establishing covariance
a. manipulating the cause before measuring the effect
The addition of a comparison group can address which of the following threats to internal validity? a. maturation b. attrition c. selection-history d. instrumentation
a. maturation
RESEARCH STUDY 13.3: Dr. Anderson is a nutritionist who helps clients lose weight prior to surgery. She is working with W. J., a male client who is planning on undergoing a heart transplant. He currently eats more than 3,500 calories a day and has been asked by his doctor to cut the number of calories to about 1,800 (400 for breakfast, 600 for lunch, and 800 for dinner). She is curious as to whether a food journal will help W. J. reduce the number of calories he eats. A food journal is used to record everything a person eats to help patients be more aware of what they're eating. W. J.'s partner also recorded the food he consumed at each meal to have complete data before introducing the journal. Dr. Anderson decides to phase in the food journal gradually, initially having W. J. record only what he ate at breakfast during the first three days after baseline (days 4-6). During days 7-9, the journal is used at lunch, too, and during days 10-12, it also is used during dinner. The data for Dr. Anderson's study are below. What type of small- N design has Dr. Anderson used with W.J.? a. multiple-baseline design b. stable-baseline design c. interrupted time-series design d. reversal design
a. multiple-baseline design
RESEARCH STUDY 10.1: Dr. Lonsbary is a cognitive psychologist who is curious about how mood affects memory. She recruited 60 high school students and divided them into three groups. Group A listened to a 5-minute piece of music intended to make them feel happy ("Happy" by Pharrell). Group B listened to a 5-minute piece of music intended to make them feel sad (a song titled "Home Is Such a Lonely Place" by Blink-182). Group C listened to no music and instead was asked to sit quietly for 5 minutes (thought to make them feel neutral). When a participant would come to her laboratory, Dr. Lonsbary would greet the participant and then ask them to roll a six-sided die. Participants who rolled a 1 or 2 were assigned to Group A. Participants who rolled a 3 or 4 were assigned to Group B. Participants who rolled a 5 or 6 were assigned to Group C. The participants were then given an unlabeled CD to listen to based on their group assignment. The CD contained either the song selection or 5 minutes of silence. They were then escorted into a different room, where they were greeted by a research assistant who conducted the experiment. The research assistant sat the participants in front of a computer screen and told them that a list of 25 words would be displayed on the screen. They were instructed to listen to the CD with headphones while trying to memorize the list of words. All participants were given the same list of 25 common words to remember (e.g., desk, gray, plane, car, mask). When 5 minutes had passed, the screen displayed a question asking them whether they felt happy, sad, or neutral. After the participant responded, a new screen was displayed asking them to type in all the words they could remember from the list of 25 words. All participants were given 3 minutes to type the words they remembered. Afterward, the participant was thanked and dismissed. In response to the mood question, a majority of Group A participants said they were happy, a majority of Group B participants said they were sad, and a majority of Group C participants said they were neutral in their mood. Dr. Lonsbary found the following results in response to the number of words remembered: Which of the following is a control variable in Dr. Lonsbary's study? a. the amount of time allowed for memorizing the words b. the type of song c. the number the participant rolled on the dice d. the mood of the participants
a. the amount of time allowed for memorizing the words
Which of the following is a reason that a study might yield a null result? a. too much within-group variance b. too much between-group difference c. a false positive d. use of a within-subjects design
a. too much within-group variance
Which of the following can help prevent testing effects? a. using a comparison group b. employing a pretest-only design c. using a clear coding manual d. establishing reliability of the measure
a. using a comparison group
Lakshmi wants to know whether a new TV show helps children learn their ABCs. She discovers there is an interaction with whether or not parents watched the show alongside the child. Which of the following statements best describes this finding? a. Learning ABCs depends on watching a TV show. b. The show improved ABC skills only for kids whose parents watched along with them. c. Only parents can teach children their ABCs. d. The show did not improve ABC skills because parents had to be there.
b. The show improved ABC skills only for kids whose parents watched along with them.
Why are factorial designs useful in testing theories? a. They allow researchers to explore the construct validity of a theory. b. They allow researchers to understand the nuances of how variables interact. c. Results from factorial designs are always intuitive. d. Results from factorial designs are typically straightforward and easy to interpret.
b. They allow researchers to understand the nuances of how variables interact.
If a narrow confidence interval contains zero, then the effect is a. significant. b. null. c. at ceiling. d. at floor.
b. null.
***RESEARCH STUDY 13.2: Dr. LaGuardia is a cognitive neuroscientist who is interested in the effect of brain concussions on the ability to recognize faces. They conduct a quasi-experimental study in which they examine football players before and after the regular season using the Benton Facial Recognition Test (a published, widely used measure of one's ability to recognize faces) to compare those who received concussions to those who did not. They find that players who had concussions during the regular season performed worse on the Benton Facial Recognition Test than did players who did not experience concussions. If Dr. LaGuardia had instead been interested in conducting a small- N design, which of the following might they have done? a. Dr. LaGuardia would have collected fewer types of data. b. Dr. LaGuardia would have likely collected other additional dependent measures. c. Dr. LaGuardia would have likely selected a topic where he expected a small effect size. d.Dr. LaGuardia would not have compared participants' performance on the Facial Recognition Test to other groups.
b. Dr. LaGuardia would have likely collected other additional dependent measures.
RESEARCH STUDY 12.4: Dr. Price conducted a study on how toddlers learn their colors. She thinks that the place where the toddlers are asked about colors and the objects they play with while learning the colors will affect the outcome. She wrote this in the methods section: "Seventy-six children (42 girls; Mage = 18 months, 14 days; SD = 17 days) were in the final group. Children participated in one of four between-subjects conditions (19 children each) differing in location (kitchen vs living room) and objects (blocks vs rings vs puzzle pieces)." What would make this a mixed factorial design? a. If there were more levels in the independent variables b. If location was a within-subjects variable c. If there is an interaction in the results d. If both location and object were within-subjects variables
b. If location was a within-subjects variable
RESEARCH STUDY 10.2: Dr. Dormeur studies sleep and sleep disorders. She is curious as to whether technology exposure before bedtime causes people to fall asleep more slowly. She recruits a sample of 60 middle-aged women from a local church who reported no history of sleep problems. She creates three conditions. All participants come to the sleep lab for three nights in a row and experience all three conditions. In the first condition (A), participants were asked to play an online game (Candy Crush) on an iPad for 10 minutes prior to going to bed. In the second condition (B), participants were asked to read an article using an iPad that discussed tricks and tips for improving one's score on Candy Crush (which took about 10 minutes). In the third condition (C), participants were asked to read a newspaper article about the inventor of Candy Crush (which took about 10 minutes). With the use of an electroencephalograph (EEG), the researcher measures how long it takes participants to fall asleep. Dr. Dormeur was concerned that asking participants how long it took them to fall asleep would lead them to suspect that was the purpose of the study. Her decision to measure how long it took participants to go to sleep using the EEG instead of self-report was meant to decrease which of the following? a. order effects b. demand characteristics c. selection effects d. counterbalancing effects
b. demand characteristics
An industrial-organizational psychologist is interested in exploring whether the relationship between group cohesion and productivity in the workplace is influenced by gender. What is the moderator variable in this example? a. type of workplace b. gender c. productivity d. group cohesion
b. gender
The likelihood that a study will return an accurate result when the independent variable really has an effect is called a. ceiling effect. b. power. c. masking level. d. floor effect.
b. power.
What can researchers do to reduce the risk of measurement error? a. make conditions comparable in each experimental group b. select measures that have high reliability and validity c. use a strong manipulation d. use large sample sizes
b. select measures that have high reliability and validity
Dr. West wants to know what kind of exercise makes people happiest. She randomly assigns participants to either a weight-lifting or cardio group. Each group does the assigned exercise for 30 minutes. They then report on their mood on a scale of 1-10. What could Dr. West do to eliminate potential confounds in her experiment? a. have participants describe their emotions however they want instead of using a scale b. use the same room and exercise instructor for both groups c. study only one type of exercise d. let participants choose what type of exercise they want ahead of time
b. use the same room and exercise instructor for both groups
***RESEARCH STUDY 12.1: Dr. Singh was interested in the way people recognize objects as members of categories. For example, what makes us recognize a dog as being a dog and not a cat? More specifically, she was curious as to whether people think about categories in a more complex way if they contemplate an "opposite" category first. For example, does a person think differently about the category of "southern" if they first think about the category of "northern"? She was also curious as to whether people categorize differently if they are shown examples of those categories (e.g., looking at pictures of different animals) compared with generating those examples themselves (e.g., drawing pictures of different animals). Dr. Singh has four groups of participants (with 30 people in each group). In Group A, participants were told to cut out pictures of dogs and cats from magazines. In Group B, participants were told to cut out pictures of just dogs from magazines. In Group C, participants were told to draw pictures of cats and dogs. In Group D, participants were told to draw pictures of just dogs. After doing this for 30 minutes, participants in all groups were asked to list the attributes that define the "dog" category. Having a higher number of attributes listed was considered to be an indication of thinking about the category in a more complex way. The results of her study are below. To determine if there is a main effect for type of activity, Dr. Singh must examine how many marginal means? By examining the marginal means, it appears that in this study
c. 2 b. there is a main effect of focus of the activity.
Which of the following is an example of a history threat? a. In a study of intelligence, participants were allowed to study the test beforehand. b. In a study of a medication, all participants know whether they are getting treatment or placebo. c. In a study of school performance, a hurricane closes the school for two weeks. d. In a study of mood, some participants were on antidepressants.
c. In a study of school performance, a hurricane closes the school for two weeks
According to the textbook, why is it important to study interactions? a. They are easier to understand than main effects. b. They are more scientific than other analyses. c. Many outcomes in psychology are interactions. d. They are more complicated than other analyses.
c. Many outcomes in psychology are interactions.
**What is the difference between a main effect and an overall effect? a. Main effects are more complicated to determine than overall effects. b. Main effects look at one variable at a time; overall effects look at all variables simultaneously. c. There is no difference between main effects and overall effects. d. Main effects are less important than overall effects.
c. There is no difference between main effects and overall effects.
The d score is a standardized measure of the degree to which the independent variable caused a change in the dependent variable. This is also known as the .a. impact factor. b. standard change. c. effect size. d. change rate.
c. effect size.
Random selection enhances ________ validity, and random assignment enhances ________ validity.
c. external; internal
Which of the following is a threat to internal validity found in within-groups designs but not in independent-groups designs? a. selection effects b. demand characteristics c. practice effects d. design confounds
c. practice effects
Experiments use random assignment to avoid which of the following? a. random selection b. carryover effects c. selection effects d. demand characteristics
c. selection effects
RESEARCH STUDY 9.2: Dr. Finkel is a social psychologist who studies romantic relationships. Several researchers have found that there is a link between income and marital satisfaction (e.g., Dakin & Wampler, 2012). Dr. Finkel is curious as to whether there is a causal link between the two variables, such that having a higher income causes higher levels of marital satisfaction. He is confident that he cannot reasonably or ethically manipulate people's income level, so he decides to use a multivariate design. He is also curious as to whether there is a causal link between these two variables or if two other variables (number of arguments and life satisfaction) can explain the relationship. He measures his three variables in a sample of 124 married couples recruited from a local community center. Given Dr. Finkel's design, which of the following issues is his study best able to address? a. the ethical issue of manipulating income level b. the issue of temporal precedence between his two variables c. the issue of possible third variables d. the issue of diminished statistical validity
c. the issue of possible third variables
Which of the following is a reason that a researcher might choose a pretest/posttest design? a. to allow for the study of spontaneous behaviors b. to determine between-group differences c. to ensure that random assignment made the treatment/comparison groups equal d. to improve construct validity
c. to ensure that random assignment made the treatment/comparison groups equal
***Dr. Persaud is curious as to whether children in a daycare center will share more after watching an educational video on sharing. Immediately before and after the video, she has several undergraduate research assistants code the sharing behavior of a group of 33 four-year-olds. Which of the following would you recommend to her to decrease the threat of instrumentation? a. using only one research assistant to code all the videos b. establishing different coding manuals for pretest and posttest c. using clear coding manuals d. asking the same research assistants to code the same children at pretest and posttest
c. using clear coding manuals
Which of the following phrases might a person encounter in a popular media article that indicates an interaction? a. "mediator variables" b. "statistically significant" c. "mixed factorial design" d. "it depends"
d. "it depends"
Dr. Gavin is conducting a 2 × 4 independent-groups factorial design. How many independent variables are in his study? a. 4 b. 8 c. 6 d. 2
d. 2
The arithmetic means for each level of an independent variable, averaging over levels of the other independent variable, are called a. factorial means. b. interaction means. c. estimate means. d. marginal means.
d. marginal means.
A small- N design that involves providing treatment and then removing treatment is known as a(n) a. stable-baseline design. b. multiple-baseline design. c. interrupted time-series design. d. reversal design.
d. reversal design.
Dr. Green is interested in conducting a 2 × 2 × 3 mixed factorial design, with 20 participants in each cell. Which of the following would NOT be a possible number of participants for this study? a. 60 b. 80 c. 40 d. 20
d. 20
Dr. Gavin is conducting a 2 × 4 independent-groups factorial design. How many cells are in his design? a. 4 b. 6 c. 2 d. 8
d. 8
**RESEARCH STUDY 9.2: Dr. Finkel is a social psychologist who studies romantic relationships. Several researchers have found that there is a link between income and marital satisfaction (e.g., Dakin & Wampler, 2012). Dr. Finkel is curious as to whether there is a causal link between the two variables, such that having a higher income causes higher levels of marital satisfaction. He is confident that he cannot reasonably or ethically manipulate people's income level, so he decides to use a multivariate design. He is also curious as to whether there is a causal link between these two variables or if two other variables (number of arguments and life satisfaction) can explain the relationship. He measures his three variables in a sample of 124 married couples recruited from a local community center. One of Dr. Finkel's colleagues argues that he should have considered years of marriage in his study, which is a known predictor of marital satisfaction. If Dr. Finkel conducts his study again and asks people to report on how many years they have been married as well, which of the following statements is true? a. He will need to add another criterion variable. b. He will need to delete a predictor variable. c. The beta value for number of arguments will remain unchanged. d. The beta value for number of arguments may no longer be statistically significant.
d. The beta value for number of arguments may no longer be statistically significant.
***RESEARCH STUDY 12.4: Dr. Price conducted a study on how toddlers learn their colors. She thinks that the place where the toddlers are asked about colors and the objects they play with while learning the colors will affect the outcome. She wrote this in the results section: "Analyses indicated significant main effects of place and object. However, the place × object interaction was not significant. This latter finding suggests that the benefit of using puzzle pieces to learn about colors is not dependent on where the puzzle is completed." Given this excerpt, which of the following statements could also be found in the paper? a.Toddlers talked more about colors in the living room but only when they played with the puzzle pieces b. Toddlers did not change their answers based on location c. Toddlers talked about colors with every toy equally d. Toddlers talked more about colors in the living room
d. Toddlers talked more about colors in the living room (?)
Which of the following people would be of most interest for a small- N design? a. a psychology student b. a person suffering from a cold c. a college student d. a person diagnosed with schizophrenia
d. a person diagnosed with schizophrenia
Adding several variables to a regression analysis can help do which of the following? a. increase the construct validity of a study b. increase the statistical significance of the results c. meet the temporal precedence criterion for causal inference d. control for several variables at once
d. control for several variables at once
Unsystematic variability in a study is also known as a. group inconsistency. b. null effect. c. situational variability. d. error variance.
d. error variance.
The question "Can the causal relationship generalize to other people, places, and times?" refers to what type of validity?
d. external
RESEARCH STUDY 9.2: Dr. Finkel is a social psychologist who studies romantic relationships. Several researchers have found that there is a link between income and marital satisfaction (e.g., Dakin & Wampler, 2012). Dr. Finkel is curious as to whether there is a causal link between the two variables, such that having a higher income causes higher levels of marital satisfaction. He is confident that he cannot reasonably or ethically manipulate people's income level, so he decides to use a multivariate design. He is also curious as to whether there is a causal link between these two variables or if two other variables (number of arguments and life satisfaction) can explain the relationship. He measures his three variables in a sample of 124 married couples recruited from a local community center. Which of the following is a criterion variable in Dr. Finkel's study? a. number of arguments b. income c. life satisfaction d. marital satisfaction
d. marital satisfaction
Spontaneous remission in clinical studies is an example of which of the following threats to internal validity? a. regression b. placebo effects c. attrition d. maturation
d. maturation
If a researcher is asking why the relationship between two variables exists, they are curious about which of the following? a. controlling variables b. third variables c. moderation d. mediation
d. mediation
Mrs. Abbott, a fifth-grade teacher, tests her children's understanding of fractions at the beginning of the year and again at the end of the year. She also tests a group of fifth graders at another school who use a different math curriculum. This type of design is known as a(n) a. nonequivalent control group design. b. nonequivalent control group interrupted time-series design. c. interrupted time-series design. d. nonequivalent control group pretest/posttest design.
d. nonequivalent control group pretest/posttest design.
RESEARCH STUDY 9.3: Dr. Cheong is a clinical psychologist who is curious about how people deal with natural disasters (e.g., hurricanes, tornados, earthquakes). His previous research suggests that there is a relationship between how much people feel their emotional well-being was affected by the natural disaster and their likelihood of developing posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms. However, he is curious as to whether the effect of emotional well-being occurs because people receive different levels of social support. He conducts a study in which he asks 174 men and women affected by Hurricane Sandy (2012) to report on how their well-being was affected by the hurricane, the social support felt after the storm, and the number of PTSD symptoms. Dr. Cheong finds support for his proposed relationship. However, in examining his data more closely, he finds that the relationship between emotional well-being and PTSD symptoms is stronger for men than for women. Dr. Cheong's finding that the relationship between emotional well-being and PTSD symptoms is stronger for men than for women suggests which of the following? a. emotional well-being is a mediating variable. b. participant gender is a mediating variable. c. emotional well-being is a moderating variable. d. participant gender is a moderating variable.
d. participant gender is a moderating variable.
RESEARCH STUDY 13.3: Dr. Anderson is a nutritionist who helps clients lose weight prior to surgery. She is working with W. J., a male client who is planning on undergoing a heart transplant. He currently eats more than 3,500 calories a day and has been asked by his doctor to cut the number of calories to about 1,800 (400 for breakfast, 600 for lunch, and 800 for dinner). She is curious as to whether a food journal will help W. J. reduce the number of calories he eats. A food journal is used to record everything a person eats to help patients be more aware of what they're eating. W. J.'s partner also recorded the food he consumed at each meal to have complete data before introducing the journal. Dr. Anderson decides to phase in the food journal gradually, initially having W. J. record only what he ate at breakfast during the first three days after baseline (days 4-6). During days 7-9, the journal is used at lunch, too, and during days 10-12, it also is used during dinner. The data for Dr. Anderson's study are below. Dr. Natchez, a colleague of Dr. Anderson, questions whether W. J. simply wrote down less in his journal as the study went on because he grew tired of completing this "measure." Dr. Natchez believes he has uncovered which of the following threats to internal validity? a. instrumentation threat b. experimental demand c. observer bias d. testing threat
d. testing threat
Dr. Carter is curious about how self-esteem changes as a result of a new counseling program. She is concerned about testing threats in her study. Which of the following would you recommend to her as a way to address this type of threat? a. conducting a pretest-only study b. omitting a comparison group c. refusing to let participants drop out of the study d. using a different measure of self-esteem at pretest than at posttest
d. using a different measure of self-esteem at pretest than at posttest
Regression is especially problematic in which of the following situations? a. when the experimental and comparison groups are equal at posttest b. when the experimental and comparison groups are equal at pretest c. when one group has an extremely low score at posttest d. when one group has an extremely high score at pretest
d. when one group has an extremely high score at pretest (when pretest day was different and performance was not rep of the norm for individual)
RESEARCH STUDY 13.2: Dr. LaGuardia is a cognitive neuroscientist who is interested in the effect of brain concussions on the ability to recognize faces. They conduct a quasi-experimental study in which they examine football players before and after the regular season using the Benton Facial Recognition Test (a published, widely used measure of one's ability to recognize faces) to compare those who received concussions to those who did not. Dr. LaGuardia finds that players who had concussions during the regular season performed worse on the Benton Facial Recognition Test than did players who did not experience concussions. In interrogating the construct validity of Dr. LaGuardia's study, which of the following statements is accurate? a.Because Dr. LaGuardia did not use a true experiment, it is impossible to determine if the independent variable has construct validity. b.Because Dr. LaGuardia did not use a true experiment, it is impossible to determine if the dependent variable has construct validity. c.Because Dr. LaGuardia studied real football players, the dependent variable appears to have construct validity. d.Because Dr. LaGuardia's participants actually experienced concussions, the independent variable appears to have construct validity.
d.Because Dr. LaGuardia's participants actually experienced concussions, the independent variable appears to have construct validity.