matching

n. a procedure for ensuring that participants in different study conditions are comparable at the beginning of the research on one or more key variables that have the potential to influence results. After multiple sets of matched individuals are created, one member of each set is assigned at random to the experimental group and the other to the control group. For example, a researcher could create two groups whose members are of the same sex and have the same family history of a disease; one group would be given a treatment whereas the other would not. Such an approach would enable the researcher to rule out sex and family history as potential explanations of the study outcome, thereby allowing greater validity to attributing any changes between the groups to the treatment. See also matched-pairs design.

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Psychology term of the day

December 27th 2024

sexual imprinting

the development of a preference for a sexual partner that occurs during a sensitive or critical period. For example, if zebra finches are cross-fostered to Bengalese finch parents for the first 40 days of life, they will prefer to mate with Bengalese finches as adults. In addition, birds often prefer to socialize with other birds that resemble those they were exposed to in the first month of life.