broall wrote:
In clinical trials of new medicines, half of the subjects receive the drug being tested and half receive a physiologically inert substance—a placebo. Trials are designed with the intention that neither subjects nor experimenters will find out which subjects are actually being given the drug being tested. However, this intention is frequently frustrated
because __________.
Which one of the following, if true, most appropriately completes the explanation?
(A) often the subjects who receive the drug being tested develop symptoms that the experimenters recognize as side effects of the physiologically active drug
(B) subjects who believe they are receiving the drug being tested often display improvements in their conditions regardless of whether what is administered to them is physiologically active or not
(C) in general, when the trial is intended to establish the experimental drug’s safety rather than its effectiveness, all of the subjects are healthy volunteers
(D) when a trial runs a long time, few of the experimenters will work on it from inception to conclusion
(E) the people who are subjects for clinical trials must, by law, be volunteers and must be informed of the possibility that they will receive a placebo
Source: LSAT
Half will receive the drug that is being tested.
Half will receive a placebo.
These clinical trials are designed so that BOTH the experimenters and subjects will be not know which group received the real drug.
The last statement begins with the word "however," so we can expect some sort of caveat or contrast with what we have read.
It's like "we try to live in this perfect idealized theoretical word where we do this and that. However..."
This however states that the intention is basically muddled because of something.
I would say this is a resolve the paradox/discrepancy type of question.
Answer choices:
A) This would complete the explanation as to why those intentions would be muddled! If it is true that sometimes the subjects that receive the real drug start developing symptoms that experimenters recognize as being side effects from that drug.
For example, lets say they want to drug a new workout drug to see how it works with weight loss. Lets say they include in this a chemical that is known to cause acne breakouts. The experimenters do not know which group was given the drug, however, once people start breaking out, this situation of who knows what can now be considered muddled.
B) This would be consistent with the experimenters not knowing which group received the placebo and which received the real drug.
C) Out of scope. We do not know what the intentions of these trials are.
D) Does not change the implications of whether or not those experimenters who started from the beginning now know which group received the placebo and which received the real drug.
E) This is applied to both groups. The experimenters will not know which group received the placebo and which received the real drug.