A nursing student is reviewing a research study in which researchers used a pretest/posttest design to examine the effect of an AIDS education intervention on teenagers' knowledge about the condition over a school year
What threats to internal validity could be present? (Select all that apply.)
a. Maturation
b. Selection effects
c. Reactivity
d. Hawthorne effect
e. Testing
ANS: A, E
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Correct Maturation could be an issue because the students may learn about AIDS from other sources over the school year.
Testing is a threat to internal validity because use of a pretest may affect subjects' subsequent responses to a posttest.
Incorrect Selection effects affect external validity or generalizability of findings.
Reactivity, or the subjects' responses to being studied, affects external validity.
The Hawthorne effect is another name for reactivity.
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