Question

Examples, please Paired design with repeated measures Paired design with matched pairs

Answer 1

Hey buddy!

The three main designs used are: repeated measures, matched pairs and independent design.

Independent design minimises the chances of order effects occurring as different participants are used, however a main problem of this design is individual differences / participant variables. How do we know if our results are reliable

Repeated measures nullify the problem of individual differences which increases the validity of the study. However, by using the same participants in each condition, order effects are likely to occur such as: the participants getting bored, feeling fatigue by the time of the second condition, or even getting more knowledgeable to the requirements of the test which in turn may lead to demand characteristics.

Matched pairs combines the both these two mentioned methods, to decrease problems such as individual differences and order effects. Two sets of participants are used but they are matched on factors such as age, sex and social background. This can be seen as effective, however, no two participants can be matched exactly- even identical twins may have different thinking or life experiences. Also this is very time consuming.

As all three have lower validity factor and this can become a problem for the experiment: we need to know that we are measuring what we say we are measuring and not order effects or individual differences.

Hope this helped All the best!