Design and use of Experiments in Project Improvement Experiments are often used in an improvement phase of many projects.

There are several different reasons that people run experiments, including screening, optimization, and problem solving. In screening experiments, investigators are trying to find the key set ingredients among many for producing a certain mixture. In optimization, experiments investigators know what ingredients to use, but are trying to find the best amount to use of each ingredient. Problems solving experiments involve trying to find what methods or combinations work best for a given process. With all of these different types of experiments, the design process is similar. Moreover, the experimental designs discussed here, typically produce the data that will be analyzed using methods discussed later in this course such as hypothesis tests for means. In this activity, we will discuss the planning process and key ideas behind designing experiments.

Design and use of Experiments in Project Improvement Paper Structure

For this task, write a paper that uses the following structure:
Begin with a one or two-paragraph introduction that summarizes the meaning of the reading material.
Answer all of the questions included in Parts 1 and 2 below. Be sure to answer questions using complete sentences and show all work in your calculations.
Provide a written conclusion, when appropriate, for the problem that you are addressing.
Include an essay section in your paper, which is described in Part 3 below.
Use the last part of your paper to include a paragraph or two that explains the information that you learned in the assignment. Support your paper with at least two references.
Part 1
Explain the difference between the terms factors and treatments. Give an example.
What are some potential problems of a poor experimental design?
Draw an outline of a randomized comparative experiment with five different treatment groups.
Explain why it is important to use the following:
a) Randomization
b) Replication
c) Control groups
a) Explain the meaning of the term block design. When is such a design appropriate?
b) Explain what is meant by a matched pairs design. Give an example.
Explain the meaning of the following terms:
a) placebo
b) double-blind
c) Confounding
d) Response
Part 2
People who provide an answer to telephone surveys typically listen to an interviewer’s introductory remarks, and then decide if they want to continue or hang up. Suppose that a study made telephone calls to randomly selected households and asked about opinions for an upcoming election. To investigate responses, the interviewer sometimes gave her name, in others she identified the university she enrolled in, and in still others she identified both herself and her university. The study recorded the percentage of each group of interviews that was fully completed.
a) Is this telephone survey an example of an observational study or an experiment?
b) What are the explanatory and response variables for this survey?
A clinical trial was created to study sinus infections. The experimental design is a completely randomized experiment that assigned 250 patients at random among four treatments as given below:
Antibiotic Pill Placebo Pill
Steroid Spray 53 64
Placebo spray 65 68
a) Provide an outline for this experimental design.
b) Describe how you would label the 250 subjects.
c) Explain briefly how you would perform the random assignment of patients to treatments. Assign the first five patients who will receive the first treatment.
A business PhD student, who lived on a naval base, looked at prices of items at the Naval Commissary and prices of the same items at Kmart. Assume that these are a random sample of items 10 items. The student wanted to test the hypothesis that the mean price at the naval base was less than the mean price at Kmart.
Items Kmart Navy
Tide 19.99 18.13
Clorox 4.29 2.57
Gain 5.39 5.13
Swiffer 7.99 5.99
Pledge 2.99 2.48
Secret 3.99 2.94
Spam 2.49 1.30
Pepsi 1.49 1.38
Chunky 1.79 1.29
Water 1.50 0.99
a) Provide an outline for the design of this experiment.
b) Identify the response variable.
c) Use statistics learned from earlier activities to investigate the results.
d) Determine if you can reach a definitive conclusion.
Independent random samples from four different brands of recently produced batteries were placed on a life test. The following lifetimes (in minutes) were recorded.
Brand A Brand B Brand C Brand D
110 118 108 117
113 116 107 112
108 112 112 115
115 117 108 119
112 119 109 118
a) Provide an outline for the design of this experiment.
b) Identify the response variable.
c) Create a graph for this data. Can you see a difference in the average lifetime of these four brands?
d) Is there any evidence that the sample data contradicts the claim that there are no differences in the average lifetime of these four brands?
Part 3
In the February 12, 2009 issue of the New England Journal of Medicine the research paper, “A Randomized, Controlled Trial of Financial Incentives for Smoking Cessation” by Volpp et al. The paper involves an experiment to study a proposal for motivating people to stop smoking.
a) Write an essay that describes the article’s main points.
b) Describe the experimental design used. Explain the response, the treatments, where randomization is used, the structure of the experiment; and then provide the results of the experiment.

Design and use of Experiments in Project Improvement Essay Description and References

Length: 5 – 7 pages
References: Include a minimum of two scholarly peer-reviewed resources.
Your assignment should demonstrate thoughtful consideration of the ideas and concepts presented in the course by providing new thoughts and insights relating directly to this topic. Your response should reflect graduate-level writing and APA standards. Be sure to adhere to Northcentral University’s Academic Integrity Policy.
Upload your document and click the Submit to Dropbox button.
External Resource (S): Books and Resources for this Week
1. Statistics in Practice
Moore, D.S., Notz, W.I., & Fligner, M.A. (2015). Statistics in practice. New York, NY: W.H. Freeman.
Read Chapter 9
2. Volpp et al. (2009). A randomized, controlled trial of financial incentives for smoking cessation. New England Journal of Medicine.
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMsa0806819
3. BUS-7200_Grading_Rubrics
Supplemental (External) Resource
NB: PLEASE BE SURE TO USE THESE RESOURCES (FIRST) ABOVE, IN ADDITION TO OTHERS YOU MAY FIND IMPORTANT