Question 4 • Academy - Algebra, Functions, and Data Analysis
A researcher is interested in whether using mental imagery can help people remember specific details when given information. To conduct the experiment, the researcher asks 100 volunteers to participate. The first 50 people to arrive are put in the treatment group, while the rest are put in the control group. The volunteers’ names are written on slips of paper and placed in a hat. The researcher randomly selects a name to determine whose turn it is to participate.
Answer
A
The researcher did not use randomization to assign people to the treatment group or the control group.
B
The researcher did not properly label the slips of paper before putting them into the hat.
C
The researcher used volunteers instead of randomly selected people from the population.
D
The researcher did not allow all participants the same chance to be included in the treatment group.
Explanation
The first 50 people to arrive were assigned to the treatment group, and everyone else was assigned to the control group. That is not random assignment: arrival order, rather than chance, determined each person’s group. Drawing a name from the hat only determines who participates next; it does not change how the groups were formed. The main problem is that the researcher did not use randomization to assign people to the groups.
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