A psychologist randomly divides patients experiencing social anxiety into three groups, each of which receives a different treatment believed to reduce social anxiety. A research assistant, who knows nothing about the study, measures each patient's level of social anxiety using a standard questionnaire once before and once after their treatment. The psychologist analyzes the data afterwards, and finds that group 3 is the only group who showed a reduction in their social anxiety scores, from pre-treatment to post-treatment.
a. Is this an experiment? Why or why not?
It is an experiment, because it demonstrates causal relationship between the treatment and the social anxiety scores.
b. Identify the independent and dependent variables.
Independent variable is the different treatment while the dependent variable is the social anxiety scores.
c. How are potential confounds minimized in this design? Explain your answer.
First, the psychologist randomly divides patient makes each individual patients have an equal chance of being assigned to any condition. Also, the research assistant knows nothing about the study and that means the experiment is a double-blind experiment, which is best type of the experiment can reduces experimenter bias.
d. Can the psychologist conclude that the treatment administered to Group 3 caused a reduction in their social anxiety scores? Justify your answer.
The psychologist cannot conclude that the treatment administered to Group 3 caused a reduction in their social anxiety scores. The reason of that it cannot eliminate the placebo effect.
When our senses are exposed to a constant stimulus for a period of time, they gradually stop sensing that stimulus (this effect doesn't last long and is called sensory adaptation). Why does this happen (explain the mechanism) and how might it be beneficial or adaptive to our functioning?
Sensory adaptation occurs because sensory neurons are fatigued. If stimulus is continuously presented, system is less responsive, and it can ignore unimportant stimuli and be ready for something important.