Abstract
Researchers considering novel or exploratory psycholegal research are often able to easily generate a sizable list of independent variables (IVs) that might influence a measure of interest. Where the research question is novel and the literature is not developed, however, choosing from among a long list of potential variables those worthy of empirical investigation often presents a formidable task. Many researchers may feel compelled by legal psychology's heavy reliance on full-factorial designs to narrow the IVs under investigation to two or three in order to avoid an expensive and unwieldy design involving numerous high-order interactions. This article suggests that fractional factorial designs provide a reasonable alternative to full-factorial designs in such circumstances because they allow the psycholegal researcher to examine the main effects of a large number of factors while disregarding high-order interactions. An introduction to the logic of fractional factorial designs is provided and several examples from the social sciences are presented.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 5-17 |
Number of pages | 13 |
Journal | Behavioral Sciences and the Law |
Volume | 20 |
Issue number | 1/2 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Jan 1 2002 |
Externally published | Yes |
Keywords
- LAW -- Psychological aspects
- FACTORIAL experiment designs
- RESEARCH
- LITERATURE
- SOCIAL sciences
- SOCIAL interaction
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Psychiatry and Mental health
- Clinical Psychology
- Law