Worksheet 22: Randomized Experiments#
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Suppose we do lots of retrieval practice in STATS 60 and the average on the exam is 90%. Is this convincing evidence that retrieval practice works?
Suppose we use the students in STATS 60 last year, who didn’t do retrieval practice, as a control group. They took the same exam, and their average on the exam was 75%. So the group that did retrieval practice scored 15 percentage points higher than the group that didn’t. Are you convinced now that retrieval practice causes more learning?
What is problematic about trying to manually balance the treatment and control groups in such a way that they are comparable?