Reference no: EM133449848

Question

Tell which of the Threats to Internal Validity are being described below.

A researcher completes a study on the whether there is a relationship between job training and crime. The researcher selects 50 adults between the ages of 18-22 and divides them into control and experimental groups. The experimental group is given a job-training program and the control group is not. Each year participants are asked to fill out a self- report on their criminal activity. The program runs for four years.

1. The unemployment rate hits a record low and even unskilled workers are reported to be finding jobs that pay ten dollars per hour.

2. For the first two years and the last year of the experiment, approximately five of the subjects in the experimental group reports criminal activity. During the third, year 13 members of the experimental group report criminal activity.

3. The number of subjects in both the control group and the experimental group falls each year.

4. No members of either group report criminal activity in the first year but members of both groups report criminal activity in the second through fourth year after the researcher assures the subjects that the surveys will not be shared with law enforcement officials

5. Ten members of the experimental group stop going to the job- training program before it is over.

6. It is discovered that a question asking subjects to report non-violent offenses was actually left off the self-report questionnaire during the third year.

7. Member of the experimental group volunteered for the program while members of the control group were simply paid 20 dollars each time they filled out the self-report

8. One of the program workers let three members of the control group into the job-training program because he/she felt bad for them.