You should present a cogent argument based on your critical analysis of the questions posed, using appropriate psychological terminology. It is not enough to answer a question by merely listing facts. City University is eager to attract new students. One strategy the university has chosen to attract new students is to demonstrate to prospective students the happiness of its current students (operationally defined as how the students rated their satisfaction with various services offered by the university on a scale of 1–10). The university officials designed a survey asking about student happiness and sent the survey via e-mail to 25 percent of City University students with equal distributions of students in each class (first-year students, sophomores, juniors, and seniors). They received responses from students in each class, and the responses are in the figure below.

The figure presents a bar graph. The horizontal axis has 4 bars each with a label. From left to right, the 4 bars are labeled as follows: First-Year Student, Sophomore, Junior, and Senior. The vertical axis is labeled Mean Happiness Score, and no values are provided. The data for each bar is as follows. First-Year Student, about one fifth of the way up the vertical axis. Sophomore, slightly farther up the vertical axis than the bar for First-Year Student. Junior, slightly farther up the vertical axis than the bar for Sophomore. Senior, slightly farther up the vertical axis than the bar for Junior.

University officials used the results of the study to try to attract new students by stating that attending City University for longer periods of time increases student happiness.

Evaluate the appropriateness of the university officials’ conclusion that being at City University longer makes students happier.

Explain how each of the following elements is related to the survey.

Random assignment

Random sampling

Measures of central tendency

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