Dr. Sheffield is a clinical psychologist who specializes in treating pathological gambling. Pathological gambling is defined as being unable to resist impulses to gamble. Bothered by not having a good measure that he can give to clients to determine whether they are suffering from this condition, he creates a new measure of pathological gambling. The measure has 15 questions, and it takes 20 minutes to complete.
To test his measure, Dr. Sheffield gives his measure to a group of people in Gamblers Anonymous (GA) and another group in Alcoholics Anonymous (AA). He finds that people in the GA group have higher scores on his new measure than people in the AA group. Why did Dr. Sheffield do this?

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

Dr. Sheffield gave his measure to two different groups that he expected to have different levels of pathological gambling. The fact that the GA group scored higher on his measure than the AA group provides evidence for criterion validity - that is, that Dr. Sheffield's measure is able to differentiate between individuals who are likely to have pathological gambling and those who are not. This type of validity is important when a measure is designed to predict or identify a particular condition or behavior.

Dr Sheffield Is a Clinical Psychologist Who Specializes in Treating