Final answer:
The claim that the t-test is not commonly used in criminal justice research because of its assumptions is false; it is a standard analysis tool used in many research areas when conditions are met or corrections applied.
Step-by-step explanation:
The statement that the t-test is not very commonly used in criminal justice research due to its stringent assumptions is false. The t-test is indeed used in criminal justice research as well as various other fields. While it carries certain assumptions, such as the need for a normal distribution with larger samples and equality of variances when comparing two groups, criminal justice research often meets these conditions or applies corrections when they are not met.
For example, when comparing the means of two groups, such as a control group and a test group in an experimental study, researchers can make use of the t-test to determine if there is a statistically significant difference in outcomes. The control group must differ from the test group by the variable studied, but otherwise, the use of a t-test is appropriate, even with complex social scenarios, assuming adherence to its assumptions, or application of robust alternatives or corrections.
Likewise, despite the complexity of issues in criminal justice, researchers can, and do, design studies to effectively use hypothesis testing, including t-tests, to inform their findings. The alternative models and methods, such as evidence factors or the use of information criteria like AIC and BIC for model comparison, can complement but do not necessarily replace the utility of the t-test in hypothesis testing.