Ch 6: Describing What People Do

Question 1

acquiescence/yea-saying

Answer 1

answering “yes” or “strongly agree” to every item in a questionnaire or interview; a type of response set

Question 2

census

Answer 2

a set of observations that contains all members of the population of interest

Question 3

cluster sampling

Answer 3

a sampling method in which researchers randomly select clusters of participants

Question 4

convenience sampling

Answer 4

choosing a sample based on those who are easiest to access

Question 5

faking bad

Answer 5

a situation that occurs when survey respondents give answers that make them look worse than they really are

Question 6

fence sitting

Answer 6

a situation that occurs when respondents play it safe by answering in the middle of the scale for every question in a questionnaire or interview

Question 7

forced-choice format

Answer 7

a question type in which respondents give their opinion by picking the best of two or more options

Question 8

Likert scale

Answer 8

a scale containing multiple response options that are anchored by the terms ‘strongly agree’, ‘agree’, ‘neither disagree nor agree’, ‘disagree’, and ‘strongly disagree’. A scale that does not follow this format exactly may be called a Likert-type scale

Question 9

masked study

Answer 9

a study design in which the observers are unaware of the experimental conditions to which participants have been assigned

Question 10

multistage sampling

Answer 10

a method of sampling in which two random samples are taken from some population: a random sample of clusters and then a random sample of people within those clusters

Question 11

nay-saying

Answer 11

answering “no” or “strongly disagree” to every item on a questionnaire; a type of response set

Question 12

observational research

Answer 12

the process of watching people or animals and systematically recording what they are doing

Question 13

observer bias

Answer 13

a bias that occurs when observers’ expectations influence their interpretation of the subjects’ behaviors or the outcome of the study

Question 14

observer effects/reactivity

Answer 14

a term referring to people or animals changing their behavior (reacting) because they know another person is watching

Question 15

open-ended questions

Answer 15

a question that allows respondents to answer in any way they see fit

Question 16

oversampling

Answer 16

a variation of stratified random sampling in which the researcher intentionally overrepresents one or more groups

Question 17

population

Answer 17

some larger group from which a sample is drawn, which the sample is intended to represent

Question 18

probability sampling

Answer 18

the process of drawing a sample from a population of interest in such a way that each member of the population has an equal probability of being included in the sample (ex: randomly)

Question 19

purposive sampling

Answer 19

the inclusion of only certain kinds of people in a sample

Question 20

random assignment

Answer 20

the use of a random method (ex: flipping a coin) to assign participants into different experimental groups

Question 21

response sets

Answer 21

a shortcut respondents might use to answer the items in a self-report measure with multiple items, rather than responding to the content of each item

Question 22

sample

Answer 22

the group of people, animals, or cases used in a study

Question 23

self-selection

Answer 23

a form of sampling bias that occurs when a sample contains only people who volunteer to participate

Question 24

semantic differential format

Answer 24

a self-report response scale whose numbers are anchored with contrasting adjectives (ex: ‘easy’ and ‘hard’)

Question 25

simple random sampling

Answer 25

the most basic form of probability sampling in which the sample is chosen completely at random from the population, perhaps by drawing names out of a hat

Question 26

snowball sampling

Answer 26

a variation on purposive sampling in which participants are asked to recommend acquaintances for the study

Question 27

socially desirable responding

Answer 27

(faking good) giving answers to a self-report measure that make one look better than one really is

Question 28

stratified random sampling

Answer 28

a sampling method in which the researcher identifies particular demographic categories of interest and then randomly selects individuals within each of the categories

Question 29

systematic sampling

Answer 29

a method of random sampling in which the researcher counts off to achieve a sample (ex: choosing every nth person in a population where n is a randomly chosen number)

Question 30

unobtrusive observations

Answer 30

an observation made indirectly, through physical traces of behavior, or made by someone who is hidden or is posing as a bystander