Definitions
What is survey research?
Process of asking people questions, recording their answers, and analyzing the results using statistical methods.
Disadvantage of face-to-face interviews
Establish rapport and allow longer questionnaires but are costly
Why is question order important?
Keep related questions in batteries of similar items, reduce confusion on part of respondent, make sure that some crucial items are kept apart to avoid undue mutual influence
The difference between the same estimate and the "real population parameter that results from the fact that only a part of the population has been surveyed.
Why was it difficult to study presidential elections starting from 1936?
Religious measures became fewer and cruder, difficult to find data that far back
Secondary analysis
Analyzing data collected by someone else, for different purposes
Disadvantage of telephone interviews
More common; face increasing public resistance and new sampling problems arrive from pervasive use of cell phones
List a benefit of survey research
permits scholars to trace public opinion and behavior overtime
The range of likely values for the "true" population value
Confidence interval
What is response set?
Interviewers simply agree to get done with the survey
Multi-item indices that are reliable
behaving the same way over time
List a cost of survey research
Requires substantial amount of time, energy, and attention for production of valid and reliable measures of concepts
Panel studies
ANES stands for
American National Election Study
Multi-item indices that are valid
showing expected relationships with other variables that should be related in theory
Self-administered questionnaires are employed mostly to study
members and organizations or activists
Interview different individuals at each point in time
Cross-sectional surveys
Measurement error