• Experiment: An experiment is a type of study design to determine whether a cause-and-

effect relationship exists between the IV and the DV.

• Extraneous variables: extraneous variable is anything that varies in the context of a study
other than the independent and dependent variables.
o Extraneous variables should be kept constant so as to minimize their effects on the
outcome.
o A confounding variable is an extraneous variable that differs on average across levels
of the independent variable.
• Internal Validity: Experiments are generally high in internal validity because of the
manipulation of the independent variable and control of extraneous variables.
• External Validity: to what extent the results can be generalized to other population and
situations beyond those actually studied.
• Between-subjects experiments: in a between-subjects experiment, each participant is
tested in only one condition.
o it is essential in a between-subjects experiment that the researcher assign
participants to conditions so that the different groups are, on average, highly similar
to each other.
• Random assignment: random assignment means using a random process to decide which
participants are tested in which conditions.
o random assignment and random sampling are two different terms. random sampling
is a method for selecting a sample from a population. random assignment is a
method for assigning participants in a sample to the different conditions.
• Placebo: a placebo is stimulated treatment that lacks any active ingredient or element that
should make it effective, and a placebo effect is a positive effect of such a treatment.
• Within-subjects experiments: in a within-subjects experiment, each participant is tested
under all conditions.
o Advantage: maximum control of extraneous participant variables.
o Disadvantage: can result in carry over effects. A carryover effect is the changes in
participants’ performance due to them repeating the same or similar test more than
once.
▪ practice effect: where there is improvement in the performance on a task
due to repetition.
▪ fatigue effect: where the performance worsens due to the boredom or
tiredness of repetition.
▪ Context effect: being tested in one condition can also change how
participants perceive stimuli or interpreter task in later conditions.
▪ Counterbalancing could be used to solve the issue. It means testing different
participants in different orders.
▪ an efficient way of counterbalancing is through a Latin square design which
randomized through having equal rows and columns. for example, if you
have 4 treatments, you must have 4 versions. like a sudoku puzzle, no
treatment can repeat in a row or column.
• Between-subjects or within-subjects: between-subjects experiments have the advantage of
being conceptually simpler and requiring less testing time per participant. they also avoid
carry over effects without the need for counterbalancing. within-subjects experiments have
the advantage of controlling extraneous participant variables, which generally reduces noise
 in the data and makes it easier to detect a relationship between the independent and
dependent variables.
• Experimenters’ Expectancy Effect: the experimenters’ expectations for how participants
“should” behave in the experiment.
• Standardizing the procedure: create a written protocol that specifies everything that the
experimenters are to do and say from the time they greet participants to the time they
dismiss them; create standard instructions that participants read themselves or that are red
to them or word for word by the experimenter; automate the rest of the procedure as much
as possible by using software packages for this purpose or even simple computer slide
shows.
• Blind Experiment: a blind experiment is a scientific experiment where wither participants or
both participants and researchers are prevented from knowing certain information that
might lead to participant bias or experimenter expectancy effect, thus invalidating the
results.
o Single blind: information that introduce bias or skew the result is withheld from the
participants.
o Double blind: information is withheld from both the participants and the researcher
to eliminate subjective bias.
• Pilot testing: it is important to conduct one or more small scale pilot tests of an experiment
to be sure that the procedure works as planned. the number of participants can be small,
but it should be enough to give you confidence that your procedure works as planned.