SURVEYS &
QUESTIONNAIRES
QUESTIONNAIRES
A questionnaire asks: “Online learning is convenient and effective.” What is the main problem with this item?
It is double-barrelled: it asks about two different things—convenience and effectiveness—in one item.
What feature most clearly distinguishes a focus group from several individual interviews conducted at the same time?
Participant interaction. Participants respond to and build on one another's contributions.
A researcher photographs multilingual signs in two neighbourhoods and compares which languages appear and how visible they are. What two types of information could the researcher analyse?
The presence/frequency of different languages and their visual prominence or visibility in public space.
A teacher introduces weekly peer feedback because students rarely revise their writing. She collects students’ reflections and writing samples, then uses the findings to change the activity for the next round. What feature makes this action research rather than simply trying a new teaching technique?
The teacher systematically investigates and reflects on the change in order to improve the next cycle of practice.
Case study research typically investigates a small number of cases in depth and in context. What additional feature helps define a “case”?
It is bounded—it has identifiable boundaries.
A researcher says, “Online questionnaires are quick, so I do not need to pilot mine.” What is wrong with this reasoning?
Administration may be quick, but good questionnaire design is time-consuming and requires pre-piloting/piloting.
In a focus group, one participant dominates while three others remain almost silent. What should the moderator do?
Manage the dominant participant and actively invite/probe quieter participants to contribute.
Two researchers photograph the same street. One counts each shop window as one sign; the other counts every sticker, poster, and notice separately. What methodological decision have they failed to define consistently?
The unit of analysis—what counts as a “sign.”
Why is simply introducing a new teaching activity not enough to call a project action research?
Action must be accompanied by systematic investigation and reflection on the change.
A researcher says, “My case is university students.” Why is this not yet a well-defined case?
The boundaries are unclear: which students, where, during what period, and within what setting/program need to be specified.
A participant is unsure about several statements and repeatedly chooses “Agree.” What response bias may this illustrate?
Acquiescence bias.
A researcher says: “The interviewer only collects participants' views and does not influence the data.” What assumption from the readings challenges this claim?
Interview data are co-constructed/interactionally produced; the interviewer participates in producing the data.
A study reports that 62% of signs in one district contain English. Why is this frequency alone insufficient for a fuller linguistic-landscape analysis?
It shows distribution/visibility but not necessarily the contextual, social, symbolic, or situated meanings of English in that space.
Two intact classes receive different teaching methods, but students were not randomly assigned to the classes. Is this a true experiment or a quasi-experiment?
Quasi-experiment, because random assignment is absent.
A researcher studies one multilingual learner using interviews, observations, writing samples, and classroom documents. Does using several data sources stop it from being a case study?
No. Multiple data sources can be used to understand the same bounded case in depth.
An established motivation questionnaire was validated with adult learners in another country. A researcher wants to use it unchanged with 15-year-olds in Kazakhstan. What methodological step is still needed?
Adapt and validate/pilot the instrument for the new population and context.
You want students to discuss a sensitive experience, but some participants may feel uncomfortable disagreeing with classmates publicly. What important weakness of a focus group should you consider?
Group dynamics may inhibit disclosure or produce conformity/socially desirable responses.
A multilingual sign is photographed and analysed only by counting its languages, while its size, placement, material form, images, and surrounding space are ignored. What broader methodological limitation does this illustrate?
Treating the linguistic landscape only as text and neglecting its semiotic/material/spatial context.
Students improve substantially between a pretest and posttest after a new teaching intervention, but there is no control or comparison group. Why is a causal conclusion weak?
The improvement may have alternative explanations—such as maturation, testing effects, or other influences—so internal validity is weak.
What distinguishes a multiple-case study from simply increasing the sample size in one case study?
Each case remains a distinct bounded case and can be analysed in depth and compared across cases.
A questionnaire produces numerical scores for “language anxiety,” but several items actually seem to measure general dislike of public speaking. What fundamental methodological problem does this create?
Construct validity: the questionnaire may not actually be measuring the intended construct of language anxiety.
A researcher wants to understand not only what students think about English, but also how they negotiate, challenge, and modify opinions while talking together. Interview or focus group—and why?
Focus group, because the interaction itself is analytically valuable data, not merely a way of collecting several individual opinions.
Two researchers obtain different percentages of multilingual signs from the same city because they selected different streets and defined “sign” differently. What does this demonstrate about linguistic-landscape research?
Findings depend on methodological decisions about site selection, boundaries, sampling, and the definition/unit of a sign; these must be made explicit.
A tightly controlled language-learning experiment establishes a convincing treatment effect, but the task is very unlike anything learners encounter outside the laboratory. Which two forms of validity are in tension?
Internal validity and external/ecological validity.
A researcher studies one student's multilingual development in great depth and concludes: “All multilingual university students develop in this way.” What is the methodological problem?
The researcher is making an unjustified statistical/generalized claim from a context-specific case. Case-study claims require careful attention to the case and context.