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Example of Spontaneous Remission
A clear example of spontaneous remission is the natural recovery from the common cold. If researchers measure the symptom severity of people with colds, feed them chicken soup daily, and then re-evaluate them a week later, the patients will likely feel much better. However, because colds naturally run their course and improve over time without any medical intervention, this recovery is an instance of spontaneous remission rather than proof that the chicken soup cured the illness.
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Research Methods in Psychology - 4th American Edition @ KPU
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Posternak and Miller's 2001 Spontaneous Remission Study
Control Group in Pretest-Posttest Designs
Wait-List Control Condition
Eysenck's 1952 Psychotherapy Effectiveness Study
Example of Spontaneous Remission
In psychological research, what does the term 'spontaneous remission' refer to?
Arrange the following stages to demonstrate how spontaneous remission can act as a confounding variable in a study that tracks only one group of participants.
A researcher finds that a group of patients with mild depression show significant improvement after 10 weeks of 'nature walking' therapy. If the researcher concludes the therapy was effective based on a study that lacked a control group, they are failing to account for the possibility of spontaneous remission.
A psychologist is evaluating a new therapy for anxiety and must account for spontaneous remission in their analysis. Match each experimental component to the logical role it plays in distinguishing the therapy's effect from natural recovery.
Spontaneous remission refers to the natural tendency for many medical and psychological conditions to improve over time without any formal treatment or intervention.
When evaluating a treatment using a one-group pretest-posttest design, how does spontaneous remission specifically threaten the study's internal validity?
When evaluating the results of a study that lacks a comparison group, a researcher who attributes a patient's improvement solely to a specific therapy may be making a flawed judgment by failing to rule out _____, which is the natural tendency for conditions to improve over time without any intervention.
A clinical trial evaluates a new therapy for depression using a one-group pretest-posttest design. Match each scenario component to the correct psychological research concept it represents.
When analyzing the internal validity of a clinical study that lacks a control group, a researcher realizes that participants' symptoms would have naturally improved on their own over time. In psychological research, this natural improvement without formal treatment is called _____.
A researcher claims a new mindfulness app reduces anxiety because a group of users reported lower anxiety after 4 weeks. Evaluate the validity of this claim by ordering the steps required to determine if spontaneous remission is a confound.
Learn After
Why might a researcher incorrectly conclude that a daily regimen of chicken soup cures the common cold if they only measure symptom severity before and after a week?
A researcher studies 100 people with colds who eat chicken soup daily and feel better after one week. Arrange the following events in the order that demonstrates how the natural course of an illness can lead to an incorrect conclusion about a treatment's effectiveness.
A researcher conducts a study where participants with a mild tension headache use a new aromatherapy patch. If the participants report that their headaches are gone after two hours—the typical time for such headaches to resolve naturally—the researcher can safely conclude that the aromatherapy patch was the cause of the relief without comparing the results to a group that received no treatment.
Researchers studying the 'common cold' measure 100 participants, provide them with daily chicken soup, and find that they feel much better after one week. Analyze the logic of this study by matching each component with the scientific role it plays in demonstrating why the results are not proof of a cure.
Suppose you are tasked with creating a research protocol to test the effectiveness of a new 'herbal remedy' for the common cold. To build a study that can distinguish between the remedy's effects and the natural improvement of symptoms over time, arrange the following steps in the correct logical order to construct a randomized controlled experiment.
A researcher claims that chicken soup is a 'proven cure' because patients recovered from their colds within one week of treatment. To scientifically evaluate the validity of this claim, a student must identify the phenomenon of _____ as a likely alternative explanation for the observed improvement.
Researchers measure symptom severity in 100 people with colds, give them chicken soup daily, and find that participants feel much better one week later. Because colds naturally run their course without any medical intervention, this improvement is best explained by _____ rather than the effectiveness of the chicken soup.
A physical therapist develops a new four-week stretching routine and tests it on 50 patients with acute lower back pain. She measures pain levels before the routine begins and again after four weeks, finding a significant decrease. She concludes the routine is an effective treatment. A research methods student argues that spontaneous remission threatens this conclusion. Which statement BEST explains the student's concern?
In a study where 100 people with colds are given chicken soup daily and re-evaluated one week later, adding a no-treatment control group—in which 100 additional cold sufferers receive no soup and are measured at the same time points—would allow researchers to determine how much improvement is due to spontaneous remission versus the soup itself, thereby directly addressing the main methodological weakness of the original one-group design.
A researcher wants to test whether a new herbal tea reduces cold symptoms. Evaluate each study feature or conclusion below by matching it to the most accurate methodological judgment about spontaneous remission.