quasikokeellisissa

Quasikokeellisissa is a Finnish term that translates roughly to "quasi-experimental" in English. It refers to research designs that share some characteristics with true experiments but lack one or more of the key elements, most notably random assignment of participants to conditions. This means that researchers in quasikokeellisissa studies do not have the same level of control over extraneous variables as they would in a true experiment.

These designs are often employed when random assignment is impractical, unethical, or impossible. For example, studying the effects of a natural disaster or a pre-existing condition would necessarily be quasikokeellisissa because participants cannot be randomly assigned to experience the disaster or have the condition. Instead, researchers work with groups that already differ on the variable of interest.

Common types of quasikokeellisissa designs include nonequivalent control group designs, time-series designs, and regression discontinuity designs. In a nonequivalent control group design, for instance, a treatment group and a comparison group are selected, but participants are not randomly assigned to these groups. Researchers then compare outcomes between the groups, often employing statistical methods to control for pre-existing differences.

While quasikokeellisissa studies cannot establish cause-and-effect relationships with the same certainty as true experiments, they are valuable for exploring phenomena in real-world settings and for generating hypotheses that can be tested later with more rigorous designs. They offer a practical approach to research when experimental control is limited.