the purpose of having a control in an experiment?

Answer 1

Controls are needed to eliminate alternate explanations of experimental results. For example, suppose a researcher feeds an experimental artificial sweetener to thirty laboratory rats and observes that eight of them subsequently die of dehydration. The underlying cause of death could be the sweetener itself or something unrelated. Perhaps the rats were simply not supplied with enough water; or the water was contaminated and undrinkable; or the rats were under some psychological or physiological stress that caused them not to drink enough; or a disease dehydrated them; or their cage was kept too hot. Eliminating each of these possible explanations individually would be time-consuming and difficult. Instead, the researcher can use an experimental control, separating the rats into two groups: one group that receives the sweetener and one that doesn't. The two groups are kept in otherwise identical conditions, and both groups are observed in the same ways. Now, any difference in morbidity between the two groups can be ascribed to the sweetener itself--and no other factor--with much greater confidence.

In other cases, an experimental control is used to prevent the effects of one variable from being drowned out by the known, greater effects of other variables. For example, suppose a program that gives out free books to children in subway stations wants to measure the effect of the program on standardized test scores. However, the researchers understand that many other factors probably have a much greater effect on standardized test scores than the free books: household income, for example, and the extent of parents' education. In scientific parlance, these are called confounding variables. In this case, the researchers can either use a control group or use statistical techniques to control for the other variables.

Answer 2

I would say it is because you need to be sure that what ever the results you see in the experiment is the cause to the specific treatment. Lets take a group of individual: A; and this is your control, and another group: B; an this is your real test subject for a new type of drug. After the experiment you realise that both A and B have developed rashes; you can conclude that the rash is not the result of the drug. In another experiment also for a new drug that claims to cure cancer for instance, and again you have two groups, A and B
A;being your control. at the end you realise that group B has no more cancerous cell, while group A, contains the same amount of cancerous cell as at the start of the experiment,you can conclude that the drug does in fact do what it claims to, and if there is side effects that did not show in the control, you can say that it is a possiblity for the side effect to re-occur

Answer 3

it allows for comparison without having to measure all of the possible variables. For example, a control group in medicine is made as much like the test group, but is not given the medicine being tested. Any improvement in the control group (the placebo effect) offsets any results in the test group even if the reasons for the improvement are unknown. In a chemical experiment, a control might involve heating and cooling both the control and the test solution, but only the test solution has the added ingredient. Changes due to the heating cycle that show up in the control are obviously not due to the added ingredient.

Answer 4

The purpose of having a control in an experiment is to determine the validity of your findings. For instance, if I was testing a new weight loss medicine on women, I'd have some taking the weight loss medicine, and some who simply carry on with their diets, or some who have been given say, vitamin C pills and told they were weight loss pills. If only the group taking the correct pills lost any weight, then they can be said to work. However, if those taking the Vitamins lost weight, then the Weight loss pills cannot be said to have worked, as is also the case if those carrying on with their usual diet lost weight.
Therefore, having a control in an experiment creates a neutral condition in order to compare to the test condition, increasing validity of one's final conclusion.
Hope this helps :-)..

Answer 5

If you are trying to determine whether changing a particular parameter has any effect on the outcome of an experiment it is necessary to carry out the experiment on a control sample which is the same as the test sample apart from the single parameter change.

For instance, if checking the effectiveness of a drug, some patients will be given the drug, others will be given a completely inert "placebo" so that none of the patients knows whether they have been given the drug or not.

Answer 6

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the controls are used to avoid inclusion of any kind of unknown variable that can influence the results of your test. controls are also taken as a reference to make a quantitative estimation of the results obtained in the test. usually two kinds of controls are used simultaneously in a test. that is a negative control and a positive control. a positive cotrol gives you the idea that your assay method is done properly and there is no problem with the procedure and the reagents used. and the negative control avoids any kind of false positive signal that may be possible due to some anonymous reasons. hope this clarifies why controls must be included in an experiment

Answer 7

good question!!!!

basically the purpose of having a control in an experiment is so you have a group who arent having anything done to them (the control group) to compare against the group who are having something done to them (the experimental group)

so if you are testing a new drug for diabetes, you want to make sure you have a group of people who are receiving the drug and a group who isnt ...... but who are the same in every other way
that way you can say for sure that the effect you saw in the experimental group was due to the drug and nothing else (in a perfect, experimental design error free world of course!)

its like a baseline to compare against

i hope thats an ok explanation im not very good at explaining sometimes :)

Answer 8

hi pal
a control is used in order to compare ur the results of the experiment conducted
moreover in the control u should add the stuff that u are testing in the experiment
in another word the control should possessed all conditions & components required
bye

Answer 9

You don’t need to exercise for long periods of time. Short, sharp sets of exercise will produce better results should you work hard. Get a omitting rope, skip for two units, do push ups for 1 minute, skip for two minutes, rest for example minute. Then change the push approximately something else like sit ups along with do the set again. Repeat it five times and it’s a fast, effective workout that will advance results than a long run or swim.

Answer 10

To act as a comparison. (It is a means by which you can compare your results.) The control contains all conditions, whereas the experiment lacks one of these conditions. Therefore, you can see if your experiment is affected by this condition alone.