Researchers are limited by ethical constraints, such as not being able to conduct an experiment designed to determine if experiencing abuse as a child leads to lower levels of self-esteem among adults
Psychologists consider differences to be statistically significant if there is less than a 5% chance of observing them if the groups did not actually differ from one another
Greatest strength is the ability to assert that any significant differences in the findings are caused by the independent variable
Random selection, random assignment, and a design that limits the effects of both experimenter bias and participant expectancy should create groups that are similar in composition and treatment
If an experiment finds that watching a violent television program results in more violent behavior than watching a nonviolent program, researchers can safely say that watching violent television programs causes an increase in the display of violent behavior