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.