On Tue, 27 Jan 2009 10:32:00 -0800, Michael Britt wrote: >When I was a young man (attending grad school in a log cabin) my >profs had me read Stanley and Campbell's "Experimental and >Quasiexperimental Designs for Research" chapter. At the time >it was considered a classic (translation: boring as all get-out, >but extremely valuable). For a few years I forced my undergrad >research and stats students to read it. I was just wondering: >does anyone require this book? And is it still considered a classic?
It depends upon your definition of "classic". William James' "Principles of Psychology" is definitely a classic but I don't think of it as required reading. Campbell and Stanley's "book" is a classic in that it established a set of concerns for experimental and quasi-experimental research that is still with us today. However, research methodology have evolved and Campbell and Stanley was superseded by Cook and Campbell which has been superseded by Shadish, Cook, and Campbell. Questions about causality have become more subtle and complicated and new data analysis techniques have raised the prospect of being able to identify casual relationships outside of the traditional experimental setting. I think that many traditional experimental psychologists may feel more at home with, say, Kirk or Winer than Campbell, who was more interested in establish causality in real world settings. The trade-off is having a high degree of confidence that one have good internal validity (but limited external validity) for limited internal validity but greater external validty or demonstrating that an intervention or program actually has a causal effect (i.e., produces beneficial outcome, such improved performance on standardized tests of reading or a sex education program actually reduce the probability of teenage pregnancy and/or STD transmission). Campbell and Stanley raised the spectre of causal inference outside of the lab and perhaps that is its greatest message. -Mike Palij New York University [email protected] --- To make changes to your subscription contact: Bill Southerly ([email protected])
