One hundred sixty people who suffer from painful diabetic neuropathy have volunteered to participate in a study. Eighty are selected at random and are given the drug gabapentin, which, although originally intended to prevent epileptic seizures, has properties that may make it useful to alleviate neuropathy. The remaining participants are given a placebo. A neurologist evaluates the symptoms of all volunteers after two months to determine if there has been substantial improvement in the severity of the symptoms. Does the use of volunteers make this study invalid?

a. yes, because of volunteer bias no, because blocking was used.
b. yes, because there is no way to determine the effect of gabapentin on people that do not have symptoms of neuropathy.
c. no, because the subjects are randomly assigned to treatment groups.