It was recently reported in a lifestyle magazine that practicing mindfulness reduces workplace stress. A researcher wanted to investigate whether this stress reduction was due to the social aspect of a group mindfulness class or simply the practice of mindfulness itself.
The researcher decided to use a matched-pairs design. She visited a large corporate office and recruited the first 24 employees she met in the communal lounge. Each employee was paired with another based on their baseline stress scores and then assigned to one of two groups.
All participants completed a validated stress questionnaire at the start and end of the study. The researcher then calculated the reduction in stress scores for each participant.
Explain one strength of using a matched-pairs design rather than a repeated-measures design in this study.
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