Chapter #8
The collection of information from a sample of individuals through their responses to questions.
What is survey research?
In survey research, where should you put demographic questions (i.e. race, gender, age, etc.)?
At the end of the questionnaire UNLESS there are more sensitive questions. If there are sensitive questions, they should go at the end and the demographic questions should come before them.
These statistics are used to describe the distribution of and relationship among variables.
What are descriptive statistics?
A list of Professor Piatak's favorite dog breeds in order classifies as this level of measurement.
What is ordinal?
When the respondent can only choose one response, the question is said to be _____________.
Mutually exclusive
If possible, this is the BEST way to conduct survey research.
Interviews!
This is a bivariate distribution showing the distribution of one variable for each category of another variable.
What is cross-tabulation?
These survey questions should be avoided, because they are asking TWO questions in one.
Double-barreled questions
When ALL possible options are presented as responses, the question is considered ________________.
This type of response allows respondents to indicate the extent to which they agree or disagree with statements.
**DOUBLE JEOPARDY IF YOU CAN ANSWER THIS QUESTION: What level of measurement are these responses?
1) Likert-Scale/Type responses
2) They are ordinal!
When this occurs, there is a lack of symmetry in the data distribution.
What is skewness?
List all of the probability sampling methods!
Simple random sampling
Systematic random sampling
Stratified random sampling
Multi-staged cluster sampling
These individuals always try to be neutral on surveys and questionnaires.
Fence sitters!
During pretesting, this process allows a small sub-sample to present any issues with the questions or responses.
What are cognitive interviews?
Regression models are an example of this type of statistic.
What are the three necessary components of causality?
1. Correlation
2. Temporal Ordering
3. Nonspuriousness
List and describe the three components that make survey research "attractive"/desirable.
1. Versatility: You can ask respondents their opinions/thoughts on ANY topic.
2. Efficiency: Surveys are fairly quick to complete and are easy to administer, especially through online instruments like SurveyMonkey.com.
3. Generalizability: This is one of the only methods of data collection that measure the opinions of a large population!
List and describe the key features of a cover letter!
Introduce yourself, professionally.
-Make it credible by using affiliation with an outside organization, such as a university.
- Personalize it: Include their names, if possible.
-Make it interesting: Catch their attention right away with your topic!
-Be responsible - YOU MUST offer protection of confidentiality (or anonymity)
-Remind them that participation is voluntary!
List and describe the measures of Central Tendency!
1. Mean: Arithmetic average of all scores in a distribution.
2. Median: The score in the middle of a rank-ordered distribution.
N +1/2
3. Mode: The most frequent value in a group
*Bimodal or unimodal
Again, the Belmont Report is supremely important in research. List and describe the three main components.
1. Respect for persons: Recognize that each person/participant has autonomy and they can make decisions on their own. Those with diminished autonomy are given extra protection (i.e. children, prisoners, etc.).
2. Beneficence: Above all, do no harm! If harm is necessary, make sure it only includes minimal risks. Try to make the benefits outweigh the risks.
3. Justice: Fairness of distribution to all participants!