Identify and discuss the steps in designing policy experiments as summarized by the National Research Council’s Committee on Research on Law Enforcement and the Administration of Justice.

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

? Choose an interesting problem—a policy question that people really care about or an existing procedure that clearly needs improvement.
? Do some creative thinking to solve legal and ethical issues that may arise.
? Rigorously maintain the random assignment of persons, cases, or other units into treatment and control groups throughout the experiment.
? Choose a design and methods of investigation that are appropriate both to the questions to be answered and to the available data.
? Adopt a team approach between researchers and practitioners and keep working in close cooperation.
? Put as much into your experiment as you want to get out of it.
? Use an experiment to inform policy, not to make policy.
? Understand and confront the political risks an experiment may involve.
? Insofar as possible, see that the experiment is replicated in a variety of settings before encouraging widespread adoption of experimentally successful treatments.
? Choose an interesting problem—a policy question that people really care about or an existing procedure that clearly needs improvement.
? Do some creative thinking to solve legal and ethical issues that may arise.
? Rigorously maintain the random assignment of persons, cases, or other units into treatment and control groups throughout the experiment.
? Choose a design and methods of investigation that are appropriate both to the questions to be answered and to the available data.
? Adopt a team approach between researchers and practitioners and keep working in close cooperation.
? Put as much into your experiment as you want to get out of it.
? Use an experiment to inform policy, not to make policy.
? Understand and confront the political risks an experiment may involve.
? Insofar as possible, see that the experiment is replicated in a variety of settings before encouraging widespread adoption of experimentally successful treatments.