Exam 6: Research Strategies and Validity

What is a confounding variable? How does it affect the validity of your research study? Describe a research study that contains an example of a confounding variable.

A research study records a score measuring alcohol use and a score measuring income level for each individual in a group of 40-year-old men.The study intends to determine whether there is a relationship between the two variables.This study is an example of the ____________ research strategy.

When the data points in a scatter plot form a circular pattern,it is an indication that there is no consistent relationship between the two variables.

Which research strategy attempts to address questions about cause-and-effect relationships but fails to produce an unambiguous answer because the study contains a flaw?

Define external validity in research design.Describe in detail one threat to the external validity of a research study.Be sure to specify how that characteristic is a threat to external validity.

Any factor that allows an alternative explanation for the results of a study is a threat to

Any factor that allows for an alternative explanation for the results of a study is a threat to external validity.

A researcher is conducting a study in which the same group of individuals participates in a series of treatment conditions that are administered over several weeks.A flu outbreak that occurs in the middle of the study would be an example of a history effect.

The degree to which your research results generalize beyond the specific characteristics of your study refers to

Any factor that limits the ability to generalize the results of a research study to different populations or different environments is a threat to external validity.

The problem with using college students as research participants is that college students are not perfectly representative of the general adult population.

If a researcher measures self-esteem with the Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale,will another researcher get the same results measuring self-esteem with the Harter Self-Esteem Measure? This is a question of

A history effect is an outside,environmental variable that influences the participants' scores in one treatment condition differently than in other conditions.

Experimenter bias and participant reactivity can threaten both internal and external validity.

The descriptive research strategy is the only strategy that is not concerned with relationships between variables.

A researcher evaluates the effectiveness of an art class by having an art expert judge the quality of student's paintings at the beginning of the class,in the middle of the class,and at the end of the class.If the art expert's standards for judgment change during the class,then the internal validity of the study is threatened by

Any factor that raises doubts about the research results or the interpretation of the results is a(n)

A research study finds that a group of participants who received relaxation training had lower exam anxiety scores than a group who did not receive training.However,the researcher suspects that the difference between groups may be caused by the fact that the participants in one group are generally smarter than those in the other.This study has a problem with

If there are two or more possible explanations for the results of a research study,then the study has a problem with external validity.

An extraneous variable can become a confounding variable if it is allowed to change systematically along with the two other variables being examined in a research study.