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Based on the provided scenario, decide how the psychologist should implement the intervention to demonstrate its effect without requiring its removal. Justify your decision using the principles of the multiple-baseline design.
Case context: A clinical psychologist is evaluating a new behavioral intervention for severe anxiety. The psychologist recognizes that once the intervention is introduced, it cannot be ethically or practically removed (reversed) to see if anxiety returns. To establish that the intervention itself is causing the improvement, the psychologist tracks the anxiety levels of three different patients over time.
Question: Based on the provided scenario, decide how the psychologist should implement the intervention to demonstrate its effect without requiring its removal. Justify your decision using the principles of the multiple-baseline design.
Sample answer: The psychologist should use a multiple-baseline design across participants by establishing a baseline for all three patients. They should then introduce the treatment to the first patient while continuing to measure the baseline for the other two. Later, they introduce the treatment to the second patient, and finally to the third, staggering the treatment at a different time for each. This staggering demonstrates the treatment's effect without the ethical and practical limitations of requiring its removal.
Key points:
- Identify the use of a multiple-baseline design across participants.
- State that baselines should be established for the multiple participants.
- Recommend introducing the treatment at a different time for each participant.
- Justify that this staggering demonstrates the effect of the treatment without requiring its removal.
Rubric: The student must recommend staggering the introduction of the treatment across the three patients at different times and explain that this demonstrates the treatment's effect without removing it.
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Research Methods in Psychology - 4th American Edition @ KPU
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Multiple-Baseline Design Across Participants
Multiple-Baseline Design Across Behaviors
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