User:Eastlaw/Clinical population

A clinical population is a population in a survey or study that consists of people who are undergoing or have undergone treatment. The use of a clinical population rather than the general population can sometimes bias sociological studies because the participants are people who have sought or been referred to treatment. If, for example, the study were testing the effects of incest, and the survey population consisted of psychological patients, it would tend to exclude those who did not experience problems leading to a perceived need for psychological treatment. It could, therefore, produce misleading conclusions as to how harmful incest is. A similar problem occurs with studies involving prisoner populations. Despite the disadvantages, such populations are sometimes used in research because of relatively easy availability of such populations to researchers.