Katherine randomly assigned 50 students to jog in place while hearing a list of

Question

Katherine randomly assigned 50 students to jog in place while hearing a list of words and 50 students to sit quietly while they listened to the list of words. She discovered that the group that was jogging performed better on a memory task (t(98)=3.77, p<.005). She goes to her department chair with the results and convinces him to remove all the chairs in the lecture hall so that the students can jog in place while listening to lectures. Student performance does not improve in the new jogging lecture hall.

There is a problem with validity. Which validity is weak in this example? internal validity, external validity, statistical validity or construct validity

Explanation / Answer

While answering the possible weakness in either of the given valdity, one should first try to find answer to the following questions.

1. Is Katherines's conclusion correct?

2. Is change in independent variable, that is chairs is indeed responsible for observed variation in dependent variable, that is performance on memory task.

3. Is the variation in performnace on memory task is be attributable to other causes?

4. Is the conclusion drawn based on statistical formula?

5. Is the study follows the underlying construct-performance on memory task is better for students who jogged compared to students who were seated.

Now, going by the questions, it seems that internal validity is weak in the given example, because, the result obtained might be due to alternative cause, viz. the students selected have in general good memory, or words selected were simple and easy to remember.

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