RESEARCH DESIGN

Research II
EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN?

 It is a description of what a
researcher would like to find out
and how to find it out. He can use
as a guide the background of
information he gathered using his
preliminary research.
WHAT IS A RESEARCH DESIGN?
 Before you can design an experiment, you
should:
1. Ask the questions you would like to be
answered;
2. Make an educated guess or state your
research hypothesis; and
3. Make a detailed description and explanation
of the procedure of your experiment.
WHAT IS A RESEARCH DESIGN?
 After formulating a hypothesis, an experimental
procedure is designed for its verification. The
experimental procedure consists of four parts:
1. Selection of the appropriate materials for the test;
2. Specification of the variable to be measured;
3. Selection of the procedure to be used in the
measurement of the variable; and
4. Specification of the procedure to be used to
determine whether the measurements support the
hypothesis.
WHAT IS A RESEARCH DESIGN?

 It is a complete sequence of steps or

procedures that need to be followed
when obtaining the needed data
during an investigation.
 It serves as a guide during the actual

experimentation.
It minimizes the cost of


experimentation while
maximizing the gathered
information relevant to the
problem.
It also validates the statistical

test because it takes into
consideration all the
assumptions that went through
the process of deriving the
various statistics.
 A research design is embodied in a research
proposal which is a written plan about what the
researcher proposes to do in his investigation.
 A research proposal contains the following
sections:
1. Introduction
2. Review of related literature
3. Methodology or materials and methods
4. Literature cited
PLANNING A RESEARCH DESIGN

 The experimenter identifies the

subject of the study, the variables, the
controls, the experimental and control
groups, the instruments and devices to
be used in the experiment, and the
statistical tools needed for the
analysis of the data collected.
EXPERIMENTAL UNIT

The subject of the study

which is the main material
used in the experiment. It is
also called the
experimental unit.
TREATMENT

Denotes any procedure

done on the experimental
unit. The effect of this
procedure is to be
measured and analyzed.
SIGNIFICANCE OF A RESEARCH
DESIGN
 Serves as a guide during the conduct of
an experimental investigation. It minimizes
cost while gaining maximum information
relevant to the problem. The assumptions
that underlie within the selected statistical
test are considered in the design of the
experiment. This makes the statistical test
of significance valid.
PRINCIPLES OF RESEARCH DESIGN

Replication
Randomization

Local control

Control of extraneous variables

REPLICATION

 The experiment should be repeated

several times to find an estimate of
variations among observations on the
group of subjects treated alike.
 Replication allows the researcher to
assess the significance of the observed
differences. Only through several
repetitions of the experiment will make
statistical test of significance possible.
RANDOMIZATION
 Refers to the assignment of the experimental
subjects to the treatments by chance. It is done
to create equivalent groups prior to the
experiment.
 It tends to average out differences among
groups. It reduces possible bias in comparative
experiments. It also assures a valid or unbiased
estimate of population parameters and the
validity of the statistical test of significance.
LOCAL CONTROL

 Done when balancing, grouping, and

blocking of experimental units are
employed in the adopted design.
 Experimental units are allocated to a

block are relatively homogeneous.

 Experimental units may be blocked
according to certain characteristics.
CONTROL OF EXTRANEOUS VARIABLES

The process of making sure

that no outside or
extraneous variables will
affect the experimental
subjects.
TYPES OF RESEARCH DESIGN

Completely Randomized
Design (CRD)
Randomized Complete
Block Design (RCBD)
COMPLETELY RANDOMIZED DESIGN (CRD)

 Treatments are assigned randomly to

the experimental subjects without
restriction.
 Experimental subjects must be

homogenous.
 It is flexible and is limited only by the
number of experimental subjects.
 It is possible that the number of replicates per
treatment is not the same for the different groups.
 The loss of information due to missing observations is
small compared to those with other designs.
 The accuracy of the design is reduced when the
experimental subjects differ significantly. Any
variations between the experimental subjects enter
into the experimental error.
 It is appropriate to use CRD if the experimental
subjects have the same characteristics and if several
drop-outs are expected.
USING THE CRD

 In single-factor experiments, only a

single factor varies while all others
are kept constant. The CRD can be
used specially for experiments with
homogeneous experimental units or in
experiments where environmental
effects are easily controlled in
laboratory experiments.
EXAMPLE

Let us say an experiment

involves three treatments and
each treatment is replicated six
times. This means that the total
number of experimental units is
18.
RANDOMIZED COMPLETE BLOCK
DESIGN (RCBD)
 Divides the experimental subjects into
more or less homogenous groups called
BLOCKS.
 Blocking is done to make sure that the
experimental subjects in a group have
similar characteristics so that the
observed differences among groups will
be largely due to the treatments.
 Blocking also helps in giving more accurate
results than CRD. There are no restrictions as to
the number of treatments or number of blocks
in the experiments.
 However, it is difficult to form blocks with
homogeneous experimental units and a large
error will be obtained when variations among
experimental subjects within a block is large.
RCBD is most appropriate to use if:

The subjects can be

categorized according to
certain characteristics
Few drop-outs are

expected
USING THE RCBD

 RCBD is used when randomization will

tend to produce groups which are not
nearly equivalent for comparison.
 The experimental units in each block are
randomly assigned to the different
treatments so that the treatments are
more or less alike in composition in terms
of the subjects’ characteristics.
 RCBD is characterized by blocks of
equal size, each of which contains a
complete set of all treatments.
 Blocking is done to reduce as much as

heterogeneity among experimental

units within each block.
EXAMPLE

How will you design an

experiment with four
treatments replicated
three times?