Question

Smither thinks that a special juice will increase the productivity of workers. He creates two groups of 50 workers and assigns each group the same task (in this case, they’re supposed to staple a set of papers). Group A is given the special juice to drink while they work. Group B is not given the special juice. After an hour, Smither counts how many stacks of papers each group has made. The above experiment could be made more valid by _____. Choose the best answer • running a pretrial or using existing data from a time when nobody drinks the juice as a baseline. • increasing the number of groups to 4 with 25 people in each group. • using coconut water instead of juice. • testing the subjects for longer periods of time

Answer 1

The best answer is: running a pretrial or using existing data from a time when nobody drinks the juice as a baseline.
This would make the experiment more valid because it establishes a baseline for comparison. By comparing the productivity of both groups with no juice consumption, any differences observed in productivity between Group A (given the special juice) and Group B (not given the special juice) can be more confidently attributed to the juice itself rather than other factors. This helps to ensure that any observed effects are indeed caused by the special juice and not due to other variables or random chance.

Answer 2

The experiment could be made more valid by:

• Running a pretrial or using existing data from a time when nobody drinks the juice as a baseline.

This option would help establish a baseline productivity level for the workers before introducing the special juice. By comparing the performance of Group A (given the special juice) with the baseline performance, it would be easier to determine whether the special juice indeed had an impact on productivity. This approach helps control for any external factors that may affect productivity, making the experiment more valid and the results more reliable.