Answer:
2 a) In Randomized Block design there are two variables one is a blocking variable the other one will be the treatment variable. Here type of shoes is the treatment variable and the type of runner is the blocking variable. Blocking is the arrangement of subjects similar in certain characteristics in to a group. Here professional runners are different from recreational runners . Blocking is done to reduce variability within groups so that variability within blocks is less than the variability between blocks. Then, subjects within each block are randomly assigned one of the shoes.
b) Randomization is the process of assigning participants a specific treatment so that each participant has an equal chance of being assigned a shoe A or B. Randomization is done using random number generation and assignment is made according to the random numbers The main purpose of randomization is to eliminate biases. If the person in a group are allowed to choose the shoes they may choose their preferred one based on their past experience of using it or one variety will be preferred by most of the subjects in the group spoiling the entire purpose of the study. for e.g a group of professionals coming from a particular region prefers type A . If randomization is employed in such a situation almost half of the professionals coming from a particular region gets type A and the other half may get type B thus eliminating the personal biases in choice. This way we can eliminate any possible biases that may arise in the experiment. So randomization and blocking are important for a randomized block design in order to minimize bias in the responses.
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