An experimental design in which the variables have an implicit hierarchy. For example, a hospital has two wings (I and II). Patients in wing I are randomly assigned to either consultant A or consultant B. Patients in wing II are randomly assigned to either consultant C or consultant D. Thus consultants A and B are nested within the wing I patients, and consultants C and D are nested within the wing II
patients. If, instead, all the patients in the hospital had been randomly assigned to one of the four consultants then this would have been a crossed design.