A researcher conducts a study to assess if doctors may uncon…
A researcher conducts a study to assess if doctors may unconsciously prescribe pain medicines at varying rates based on a patient’s races. The researcher gains access to historical hospital patient data that includes patients’ races, and the type and amount of any pain medicine prescribed. The researcher calculates the frequencies at which doctors prescribe pain medicines by race. The results indicate a modest relationship between a patient’s race and the strength of pain medicines prescribed. That is, the results revealed a general tendency for some doctors in the sample to prescribe more and stronger pain medicines to persons of certain races more than others, suggesting a possible unconscious bias based on race in the prescribing of pain medicine. The research method in this example is the ____________________ method.