Deck 6: Overview of Epidemiologic Study Designs

Question 1

Which type of observational study examines one or more health effects of exposure to a single agent?

A) Cohort study
B) Ecological study
C) Case-control study
D) Cross-sectional study

Answer 1

Cohort study

Question 2

Which type of study evaluates an association using the population rather than the individual as the unit of analysis?

A) Cohort study
B) Ecological study
C) Case-control study
D) Cross-sectional study

Answer 2

Ecological study

Question 3

Which of the following is a method of sampling a population in which researchers identify and enroll cases of disease and a sample of the source population that gave rise to the cases?

A) Cohort study
B) Ecological study
C) Case-control study
D) Cross-sectional study

Answer 3

Case-control study

Question 4

The main disadvantage of using which type of control is the difficulty in determining appropriate illnesses for inclusion?

A) Population controls
B) Hospital and clinic controls
C) Dead controls
D) Friend/spouse/relative controls

Question 5

Because cases serve as their own controls, which design has several advantages, including the elimination of confounding by characteristics such as gender and race and the elimination of a type of bias that results from selecting unrepresentative controls?

A) Cohort study
B) Ecological study
C) Cross-sectional study
D) Case-crossover study

Question 6

The high degree of validity in which type of study stems mainly from the investigator's ability to randomize subjects to either the treatment group or the comparison group and thereby control for distortions produced by confounding variables?

A) Cohort study
B) Ecological study
C) Experimental study
D) Case-crossover study

Question 7

Which type of studies typically take a snapshot of a population at a single point in time and therefore usually measure the disease prevalence in relation to the exposure prevalence?

A) Cohort study
B) Ecological study
C) Case-control study
D) Cross-sectional study

Question 8

Because observational studies are often infeasible because of difficulties enrolling participants, high costs, and thorny ethical issues, most epidemiological research is conducted using experimental studies.

Question 9

Both the cross-sectional and ecological designs have important limitations that make them less scientifically rigorous than cohort and case-control studies.

Question 10

Epidemiological studies that try to determine the relationship between an exposure and a disease are immune to the disturbing influences of extraneous factors known as confounders.

Question 11

Which term includes both surveillance, whose purpose is to monitor aspects of disease occurrence and spread that are pertinent to effective control, and epidemiological research, whose goal is to harvest valid and precise information about the causes, preventions, and treatments for disease?

A) Study
B) Trial
C) Hypothesis
D) Monitoring

Question 12

The use of placebos permits which of the following of study participants and investigators, so both are unaware of the participant's treatment assignment?

A) Blocking
B) Masking
C) Stratification
D) Standardization

Question 13

The process of gaining the agreement of all eligible and willing individuals to participate in an experimental trial is referred to as which of the following?

A) Implied consent
B) Informed consent
C) Expressed consent
D) Explicit consent

Question 14

The failure to observe the requirements of a study protocol is known as which of the following, and this may occur in the treatment group, the comparison group, or both?

A) Disobedience
B) Noncompliance
C) Nonadherence
D) Maladjustment

Question 15

Which of the following is an increasingly popular form of research in epidemiology that uses computer simulations to study the complex interactions among individuals, their physical and social environments, and time?

A) Linear regression
B) Dose-response relationships
C) Agent-based modeling
D) Statistical inference

Question 16

Over the past 3 decades, the traditional view that which type of study is a backward cohort study has been supplanted by a modern view that asserts that it is merely an efficient way to learn more about the relationship between exposure and a disease?

A) Case-control study
B) Ecological study
C) Experimental study
D) Case-crossover study

Question 17

Which type of study can be used "to understand how context affects the health of persons and groups through selection, distribution, interaction, adaption, and other responses"?

A) Case-control study
B) Ecological study
C) Experimental study
D) Case-crossover study

Question 18

Observational studies provide information on exposures that occur in natural settings, and they are not limited to preventions and treatments.

Question 19

Experimental studies are commonly classified by their objective, that is, by whether they investigate a measure that prevents disease occurrence or a measure that treats an existing condition.

Question 20

The classic analytic approach for an experimental study is known as a treatment assignment analysis.