Question

Choose a type of quasi-experimental design and make up an example of a study that would use that design. Identify some possible confounds in the study (particularly because it’s a quasi-experimental design).

Answer 1

The study aims at the effect of smoking on the lung capacity of smoking and non-smoking athletes. Two groups will be used for the study; one consists of the smoker athletes (experimental group) and other consists of non smoker athletes (control group). They will be measured on their lung capacity. Analysis will be done based on the measurements obtained.

Quasi experimental design has the limitation of having issues with internal validly. In this study we have not randomly assigned the subjects to the experimental and control groups. Which means that the groups may not be similar to each other, which can cause many confounding variables. An example of confounding variable is that the smoker group may have more stress or anxiety due to which they smoke. So, the effect of smoking may not be directly associated with lung capacity, but it may be due to anxiety or stress