NRS 433 Topic 3 DQ 1 Provide examples of experimental and nonexperimental research design

NRS 433 Topic 3 DQ 1 Provide examples of experimental and nonexperimental research design

NRS 433 Topic 3 DQ 1 Provide examples of experimental and nonexperimental research design

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Topic 3 DQ 1

Apr 18-20, 2022

Provide examples of experimental and nonexperimental research design. Contrast the levels of control applied to each.

Posted Date

Apr 24, 2022, 6:13 PM

I have another example regarding patient fatigue. How variable is an oncology patient’s fatigue? I do not think their fatigue is a discrete measurement. For many of my patients, they associate their level of fatigue with when they last received chemotherapy or where they are in their chemotherapy cycle. Additionally, a patient’s fatigue can be related to anemia if the chemotherapy has caused their hemoglobin and hematocrit to drop.

Of course, there are some patients who do not experience fatigue, as you mentioned. Other patients have minimal declines in their energy level, and others are utterly exhausted. For these patients, we assess them to ascertain if blood products or IV fluids are needed. Following these interventions and when patients return for evaluation, their fatigue level is assessed again. I do feel that their responses reveal an improvement in their fatigue at their follow-up appointment. No matter their responses, this would be difficult for researchers.

An example of nonexperimental research involves observing the behavior of patients’ reactions to pet therapy. I am interested in knowing how people who are not “pet people” react to pet therapy. In the study performed by Thodberg et al. (2015), nursing home residents who were afraid of dogs or had an allergy to dogs were excluded. They explicitly mentioned that exclusion criteria were fear or an allergy, but did not discuss if residents had a dislike of dogs.

Thodberg et al. (2015) discuss the experimental study they completed regarding pet therapy and its impact on the nursing home residents’ sleep, psychiatric state, and weight. The researcher would need participants to sign consents to participate in this study. Interestingly, the participants had a cognitive decline during the experimental period (Thodberg et al., 2015). So, either non-experimental or experimental there are factors that can cause bias in this research study. Can you think of a type of bias?

 

Thodberg, K., Sørensen, L. U., Christensen, J. W., Poulsen, P. H., Houbak, B., Damgaard, V., Keseler, I., Edwards, D., & Videbech, P. B. (2015). Therapeutic effects of dog visits in nursing homes for the elderly. Psychogeriatrics, 16(5), 289–297. https://doi.org/10.1111/psyg.12159

Nursing research is extensive, and researchers use different designs to collect data and make inferences about various phenomena. Some researchers prefer the experimental design, while others rely on the non-experimental design. The main difference between these designs is how they deal with variables. Experimental design allows manipulation of variables, but the non-experimental design does not (Harding et al., 2021). Practical examples can help elucidate the differences between experimental and non-experimental research designs.

A suitable example of experimental research design is testing a new depression medication through a randomized controlled trial. In this experiment, the experimental group receives the medication while the control group receives a placebo. Participants can only belong to one of the groups. Non-experimental research may be carried out on the treatment to determine its characteristics, such as the quantity and chemical components. Another appropriate example is an experiment on the effectiveness of physical exercise on diabetic adults. One group goes through intensive exercise without a change in diet while the other participates in dietary modifications. Non-experimental research can be assessing the features of dietary modifications necessary to reducing obesity.

Regarding the levels of control, experimental research design exerts control on extraneous variables. Laksana et al. (2020) described extraneous variables as the variables not being investigated but can affect the outcomes of the research study. As a result, experimental research tampers with the natural setting. On the other hand, experimental research environments are natural and do not control extraneous variables. Harding et al. (2021) further posited that the most distinct difference between experimental and non-experimental research design is the researcher’s ability to control independent variables. Experimental research is manipulative, while non-experimental research does not interfere with the natural setting. The control is justified since researchers should control variables that can lead to inaccurate deductions.

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References

Harding, D. J., Sanbonmatsu, L., Duncan, G. J., Gennetian, L. A., Katz, L. F., Kessler, R. C., … & Ludwig, J. (2021). Evaluating contradictory experimental and nonexperimental estimates of neighborhood effects on economic outcomes for adults. Housing Policy Debate, 1-34. https://doi.org/10.1080/10511482.2021.1881985

 

Laksana, E., Aczon, M., Ho, L., Carlin, C., Ledbetter, D., & Wetzel, R. (2020). The impact of extraneous features on the performance of recurrent neural network models in clinical tasks. Journal of Biomedical Informatics, 102, 103351. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jbi.2019.103351

Hello Natalee. Thanks for the insightful discussion. From your discussion, I have learned that experimental design allows manipulation of variables, but the non-experimental design does not. There are two major types of research designs: experimental and nonexperimental. Experimental designs are used when the researcher wants to control and manipulate the variables in a study, in order to test a specific hypothesis (Harding et al., 2021). Nonexperimental designs, on the other hand, are used when the researcher does not want to manipulate the variables but rather wants to simply observe and describe what is happening. The level of control applied to each type of design varies (Leventhal & Dupéré, 2019). Experimental designs tend to have more control, since the researcher is able to specifically target and manipulate certain variables. Nonexperimental designs generally have less control, since the researcher is not actively manipulating any variables but is instead only observing what is happening naturally (Edmonds & Kennedy, 2017). Experimental research is manipulative, while non-experimental research does not interfere with the natural setting.

 

References

Edmonds, W., & Kennedy, T. (2017). Quantitative methods for nonexperimental research. An Applied Guide to Research Designs: Quantitative, Qualitative, and Mixed Methods. Seconded Thousand Oaks: SAGE Publications, Inc, 117-119. https://methods.sagepub.com/book/an-applied-guide-to-research-designs-2e/i949.xml

Harding, D. J., Sanbonmatsu, L., Duncan, G. J., Gennetian, L. A., Katz, L. F., Kessler, R. C., … & Ludwig, J. (2021). Evaluating contradictory experimental and nonexperimental estimates of neighborhood effects on economic outcomes for adults. Housing Policy Debate, 1-34. https://doi.org/10.1080/10511482.2021.1881985

Leventhal, T., & Dupéré, V. (2019). Neighborhood effects on children’s development in experimental and nonexperimental research. Annual review of developmental psychology, 1, 149-176. https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev-devpsych-121318-085221

Like your example of an RCT in experimental research I was interested to read this randomized controlled trial by Jain et al. (2019) on the effects of yoga in patients with heart failure. The inclusion criteria for the study was stable systolic HF, ages 18-65, left ventricular ejection fraction 30-40%, and unchanged pharmacologic therapy in the last 3 months (Jain et al., 2019). While they excluded people with instances of acute coronary syndrome in the last 6 months, comorbidities of COPD, liver failure, renal failure, and malignancy, and those unable to do yoga (Jain et al., 2019). They randomized the 60 participants into two groups, the control group received their standard medication therapy and the other group that received that plus yoga (Jain et al., 2019). The study lasted 12 weeks and the results found several beneficial effects in the group doing yoga: improvement in ejection fraction, quality of life, and reduction in NTproBNP and CRP levels (Jain et al., 2019). The authors cite a limitation that participating in yoga could not be blind, so they cannot rule out a placebo effect in the quality of life measurement (Jain et al., 2019). Nonetheless, the lab results cannot be disputed so the findings do have clinical significance and this leads to generalizability. I chose this article because to me it provided a clear picture of the topic we are discussing this week. While reading the study I was able to dissect attributes in ways I would not previously have been able to do.

Jain, A., Manchanda, S., Madan, K., Bhola, S., & Sawhney, J. (2019). Effect of yoga in Heart Failure: randomized trial. Indian Heart Journal, 71, S37. https://doi-org.lopes.idm.oclc.org/10.4103/ijoy.ijoy_183_21

Experimental research studies is highly controlled research in which researcher manipulates one or more variables to determine effect on other variables (McNiff & Petrick, 2018). Experimental research design is often considered a gold-standard in research designs and more protected from bias and subjectivity compare to other research methods. It is widely used method in science, psychology, social studies and education. It is considered to have the most reliable outcomes and the most definite answers and less chance of bias IMcNiff & Pertick, 2018). Experimental research design is based on comparison of two or more groups where the participants are randomly selected and neither the participants nor the researcher would know if they were receiving the treatment or intervention or the placebo, which makes experimental research is a highly controlled and manipulated environment. In this quantitative research design, one or more independent variables are manipulated and applied to one or more dependent variables and the effect on the dependable variables is observed, measured and recorded, therefore it allows the researcher to draw a reasonable conclusion regarding cause -effect relationships between two variables types. This type of research is essential for nursing science which heavily relies on evidence best practice. Experimental studies are considered capable of generating substantial evidence (Gonella, Di Giulio, Palese, Dimonte, & Campagna,2019). For example, experimental study with nursing staff related to the knowledge about pressure ulcers was conducted among 71 nursing staff divided into intervention group and control group. Data was collected through validated questionnaire and the scores of the groups were analyzed before and after intervention concluded that educational interventions on staging, evaluation and prevention of pressure ulcers contributed significantly to the increase of correct responses score in the knowledge test of the intervention group and improved their knowledge on the subject (Baron, Reuter, Burgos, Cavali, Brandenburg & Krug, 2016).

On the other hand, in non-experimental research design the environment of the research cannot be controlled or manipulated by a researcher at will because it takes place in a real life settings, where extraneous variables cannot be eliminated. Therefore the relationships between cause and effects cannot be clearly established. Another term for this type of research is observational because the researcher observes natural occurrences without intervention (Glasofer & Townsend, 2019). Findings from non-experimental research is the first step in determining whether an experimental design is called for. For example, a researcher may want to study exercise habits among teenagers with type 2 diabetes.

It can not be said that one method is better than the other. Each one is equally valid depending on what is going to be studied and / or on the perspective that the researcher wants to give to his/her work. Both research designs are valuable for advancing nursing practice and nursing profession as a whole.