A pharmaceutical company wants to test the effectiveness of a new allergy drug.

Question

A pharmaceutical company wants to test the effectiveness of a new allergy drug. The company identifies 250 females 30-35 years old who suffer from severe allergies. The subjects are randomly assigned into two groups. One group is given the new allergy drug and the other is given a placebo that looks exactly like the new allergy drug. After six months, the subjects' symptoms are studied and compared. Is this a completely randomized design, or a randomized block design? How do you know? Identify the explanatory variable for this experiment. Identify the response variable for this experiment. What are some potential lurking variables that may affect subjects' allergies, but were not taken into account in the experimental design as explained? Come up with at least two.

Explanation / Answer

a)

Experiemnt is divided into control group and placebo. So it is a randomised block design

b)

Explanatory variable is proportion of patient whose symptoms in placebo group

c)

REsponse variable is  proportion of patient whose symptoms in control group

d)

It is argued however that placebos cannot help with all conditions and that if a patient does not believe it will work, then it wont. This strips away any of the effectiveness that the placebo could have. As mentioned before it can also be unethical as the person may believe they are getting better, when in fact they arent and the medication they are taking has no effect at all. This also causes problems with regard to the doctor-patient relationship, because if the patient discovers that they are indeed being prescribed placebos they may lose trust in their doctor which can cause many problems in their future treatment.

All in all, many argue that placebos should not be used as they contain no physiological effect and are inappropraite when a drug that has a real effect can be used instead. But if the use of placebos can make the patient believe they are improving, it can help the patient deal with their condition and even have more of a positive effect than a real drug.

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