Lecture 14 9/19/24

Question 1

What are the types of descriptive studies?

Answer 1

-case report
-case series
-survey

Question 2

What are the types of observational analytical studies?

Answer 2

-cross-sectional
-case-control
-cohort

Question 3

What are the types of experimental analytical studies?

Answer 3

-controlled trials
-laboratory

Question 4

What are the most important values of studies?

Answer 4

quality: critical proof/evidence and internal validity
relevance: practical reality and external validity

Question 5

What is internal validity?

Answer 5

having no major methodological problems or biases

Question 6

What is external validity?

Answer 6

ability to generalize the results to the target population

Question 7

What are the basic components of a study?

Answer 7

-study pop.
-determining “treatment” or “risk factor” groups
-assessment of outcomes
-analysis of differences in outcomes between groups
-interpretation of analysis
-extrapolation of results from study pop. to target pop.

Question 8

What are the basic steps of a study?

Answer 8

-hypothesis
-reference pop.
-study pop.
-selection of individuals/groups
-follow-up or trace-back
-statistical analysis
-interpretation

Question 9

Which steps of a study contribute to external validity?

Answer 9

-hypothesis
-reference population
-study population
-selection of individuals/groups

Question 10

Which steps of a study contribute to internal validity?

Answer 10

-selection of individuals/groups
-follow-up or trace-back
-statistical analysis
-interpretation

Question 11

How do experimental studies differ from observational studies?

Answer 11

experimental: researcher manipulates some factor to see the impact on the outcome
observational: no manipulation by researcher; researcher simply observes what is occurring in “real world”

Question 12

How do experimental studies compare to observational studies in terms of validity?

Answer 12

-experimental studies often have high internal validity but lower external validity
-observational studies are more prone to bias but have higher external validity

Question 13

What is confounding bias?

Answer 13

when the researcher fails to consider all possible causes of an outcome and falsely assumes that one cause is the result of the outcome when it could be another

Question 14

What is the purpose of the control group?

Answer 14

to compare the treatment/risk factor group to something in order to determine if there is an effect