Random assignment is a crucial component of experiment design.Failing to use random assignment when placing participants into groups would have the most effect on the ____________ of an experiment.

Question

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Random assignment helps to control for extraneous variables and ensures that the groups are comparable at the start of the experiment. Without random assignment, it is more likely that the groups will differ on one or more important variables, which could influence the outcome of the study. This would compromise the internal validity of the experiment, or the ability to draw accurate conclusions about cause-and-effect relationships between the independent variable and the dependent variable. External validity refers to the generalizability of the findings to other populations or settings, measurement validity refers to the accuracy of the measures used in the study, and statistical significance refers to whether the results are due to chance or a real effect. While these are all important aspects of experimental design, random assignment is specifically related to internal validity.

Random Assignment Is a Crucial Component of Experiment Design