Answer to Question #62772 in Psychology for paulette mcswain

Question

Directional and nondirectional hypotheses can be easily interchanged according to the hypothesis the researcher is testing. For instance, a drug company might predict that a drug will help a subject lose weight while another drug company might predict that a drug will alter a subject's weight.

Describe a situation in which you would test a directional hypothesis. Be sure to state the independent variables (e.g., drug or placebo) and the dependent variables (e.g., weight loss) clearly and explain why the hypothesis is directional. Then, revise the same situation to make it nondirectional. Explain which according to you is more appropriate and why. Evaluate the practice of altering the alpha level so that a two-tailed test will have a 5% rejection region on both sides of the curve for a total of 10% instead of having a 2.5% rejection region on both sides in order to maintain a 5% alpha.