A researcher is conducting an experiment on the effect of alcohol consumption on reaction time and half of the subjects drink alcoholic drinks and half drink non-alcoholic versions of the same drinks. The subjects receiving the non-alcoholic drinks are the ____ group and are used in the study to minimise the influence of ____.

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

The group receiving the non-alcoholic drinks is the control group because they are used as a comparison to the experimental group (who received the alcoholic drinks). The control group is used to minimize the influence of extraneous factors that could affect the dependent variable (reaction time) and is essential to testing the effect of the independent variable (alcohol consumption). The purpose of using the non-alcoholic drinks in the control group is to minimize the influence of the placebo effect, as participants may expect to experience certain effects from drinking alcoholic drinks, and the non-alcoholic drinks work as a placebo. Sampling bias is not relevant to this scenario.

A Researcher Is Conducting an Experiment on the Effect of Alcohol