Chapter 10

Question 1

Which is a population?
A) Four hundred nurses selected from a membership list of the American Nurses’ Association
B) All traumatic brain injury clients hospitalized in intensive care units in California during 2017
C) Caregivers recruited into a study because they are caring for patients with Parkinson disease
D) Study participants diagnosed with COPD who currently smoke

Answer 1

B) All traumatic brain injury clients hospitalized in intensive care units in California during 2017

Question 2

A nurse researcher identified her accessible population as women with high-risk pregnancies in the state of New York. Which population might the researcher target?
A) All pregnant women in the state of New York
B) All women with high-risk pregnancies in the United States
C) All women with high-risk pregnancies in the city of Albany, New York
D) All pregnant women in northeast United States

Answer 2

B) All women with high-risk pregnancies in the United States

Question 3

A nurse researcher is studying fear of falling in community-dwelling elders. Which might be a reasonable exclusion criterion?
A) People age 65 years or younger
B) People who live in their own homes
C) People who have periods of dizziness
D) People who are married

Answer 3

A) People age 65 years or younger

Question 4

In the context of a study, what is sampling?
A) Identifying a set of criteria for selecting study participants
B) Determining who is eligible to participate in a study
C) Selecting a subset of the population to represent the entire population
D) Ensuring that every element in the population has an equal chance of being included in the study

Answer 4

C) Selecting a subset of the population to represent the entire population

Question 5

What is sampling bias in quantitative studies?
A) Lack of heterogeneity in the population on the attribute of interest
B) Sample selection using nonprobability sampling methods
C) The margin of error in the data obtained from samples
D) Systematic over- or underrepresentation of a key attribute vis-à-vis the population

Answer 5

D) Systematic over- or underrepresentation of a key attribute vis-à-vis the population

Question 6

In quantitative studies, what is a key criterion for evaluating sample quality?
A) How representativeness the sample is of the population
B) How easy it is to recruit sample members
C) How convenient it is to the researchers
D) How ethically sound the recruitment strategy is

Answer 6

A) How representativeness the sample is of the population

Question 7

A nurse researcher is studying medication compliance in hypertensive patients. Among those recruited to participate in the study, 50% of the women and 20% of the men agreed to participate. This situation is likely to lead to:
A) revised eligibility criteria.
B) a power analysis.
C) revised definition of the target population.
D) sampling bias.

Answer 7

D) sampling bias.

Question 8

Which statement about sampling is true?
A) The most basic units of a population are referred to as strata.
B) Strata are a means of equating the accessible population with the target population.
C) In a population of geriatric patients, those with and without a diagnosis of dementia would comprise two strata.
D) The use of strata in a sampling strategy can reduce the representativeness of the sample.

Answer 8

C) In a population of geriatric patients, those with and without a diagnosis of dementia would comprise two strata.

Question 9

A nurse researcher recruits study participants by placing a recruitment poster at the entrance to a neurology clinic. What type of sampling did the researcher use?
A) Convenience sampling
B) Quota sampling
C) Purposive sampling
D) Consecutive sampling

Answer 9

A) Convenience sampling

Question 10

A nurse researcher is studying emergency department visits by parents of children under age 3 years who were low-birth-weight infants. Every parent who brought a low-birth-weight child to the emergency department over a 12-month period was invited to participate in the study. What type of sampling did the researcher use?
A) Convenience sampling
B) Quota sampling
C) Purposive sampling
D) Consecutive sampling

Answer 10

D) Consecutive sampling

Question 11

Which sampling design would be most likely to yield a representative sample?
A) Consecutive sampling
B) Convenience sampling
C) Purposive sampling
D) Quota sampling

Answer 11

A) Consecutive sampling

Question 12

Strata are incorporated into the design of which sampling approach?
A) Consecutive
B) Purposive
C) Quota
D) Convenience

Answer 12

C) Quota

Question 13

A researcher is studying the relationship between stress and diet among college students. The researcher recruits students by sending out an e-mail blast, and then includes in the sample the first 100 male and 100 female students who volunteer to participate. What type of sampling did the researcher use?
A) Convenience sampling
B) Quota sampling
C) Purposive sampling
D) Consecutive sampling

Answer 13

B) Quota sampling

Question 14

Which is the weakest form of sampling for quantitative studies?
A) Convenience sampling
B) Quota sampling
C) Purposive sampling
D) Consecutive sampling

Answer 14

A) Convenience sampling

Question 15

Which is a probability sampling method?
A) Convenience sampling
B) Systematic sampling
C) Consecutive sampling
D) Quota sampling

Answer 15

B) Systematic sampling

Question 16

A researcher was studying nurses’ attitudes toward evidence-based practice and sent a questionnaire to a sample of nurses on a membership roster of a professional organization, using probability methods to select the members. What type of sampling did the researcher use?
A) Simple random sampling
B) Stratified random sampling
C) Multistage sampling
D) Systematic sampling

Answer 16

A) Simple random sampling

Question 17

A researcher extracted information about hospital readmissions from a population of 9,000 patient records. The researcher sampled every 30th record from the population, beginning with record number 7. What type of sampling did the researcher use?
A) Simple random sampling
B) Stratified random sampling
C) Multistage sampling
D) Systematic sampling

Answer 17

D) Systematic sampling

Question 18

If a target population contains 10,600 elements and the researcher seeks a systematic random sample of 50. What is the sampling interval?
A) 106
B) 600
C) 212
D) 50

Answer 18

C) 212

Question 19

A researcher used a systematic sampling plan. The sample size was 200. The sampling interval was 250. The first element drawn was 196. What is the second element?
A) 396
B) 450
C) 446
D) 646

Answer 19

C) 446

Question 20

Which term is used for the difference between sample values and population values?
A) Sampling error
B) Sampling interval
C) Sampling bias
D) Sampling frame

Answer 20

A) Sampling error

Question 21

Which is a consequence of having too small a sample?
A) Lack of control over confounding variables
B) Insufficient power to detect differences in groups being compared
C) Lack of ability to stratify the sample
D) Sampling bias

Answer 21

B) Insufficient power to detect differences in groups being compared

Question 22

A nurse researcher studied smokers versus nonsmokers in terms of their levels of stress. Which would be a factor affecting the sample size requirements for this study?
A) The type of sampling used (e.g., convenience, random, etc.)
B) The number of eligible people in the sampling pool
C) The size of the target population
D) How large the group differences on the outcome are in the population

Answer 22

D) How large the group differences on the outcome are in the population

Question 23

What procedure do researchers use to estimate how large a sample they need?
A) Randomization
B) Screening
C) Power analysis
D) Stratification

Answer 23

C) Power analysis

Question 24

Which data collection method is the most widely used by nurse researchers?
A) Records
B) Self-reports
C) Observation
D) Biophysiologic measures

Answer 24

B) Self-reports

Question 25

ata from self-reports are sometimes called:
A) interviews.
B) questionnaires.
C) observations.
D) patient-reported outcomes.

Answer 25

D) patient-reported outcomes.

Question 26

Which is a major advantage of closed-ended questions?
A) They are easy to construct.
B) They are relatively easy to analyze.
C) They encourage in-depth responses.
D) They are not subject to response biases.

Answer 26

B) They are relatively easy to analyze

Question 27

Which is an example of an open-ended question?
A) Are you male or female?
B) Do you take a daily multivitamin?
C) What types of support did you feel you needed after your surgery?
D) How many cups of coffee do you drink each day?

Answer 27

C) What types of support did you feel you needed after your surgery?

Question 28

Why are interviews usually preferable to questionnaires for collecting research data?
A) They are less expensive.
B) They yield data that are easier to analyze.
C) Response rates are usually higher.
D) They offer the possibility of anonymity.

Answer 28

C) Response rates are usually higher.

Question 29

Which statement about interviews and questionnaires is true?
A) Questionnaires are feasible with most people.
B) Questionnaires offer the possibility of anonymity.
C) Questionnaires are more costly to administer than interviews.
D) Interviews can more readily be used to gather data from geographically dispersed samples.

Answer 29

B) Questionnaires offer the possibility of anonymity.

Question 30

A questionnaire included “During my hospital stay, staff were respectful of my needs as an individual.” Participants were asked to indicate, on a 5-point scale, the degree to which they agreed or disagreed with the statement. This question represents:
A) a forced choice question.
B) a rank order question.
C) a visual analog scale.
D) an item on a Likert scale.

Answer 30

D) an item on a Likert scale.

Question 31

On a 20-item Likert scale with five response alternatives, the range of possible scores is:
A) 0 to 100.
B) 20 to 80.
C) 20 to 100.
D) 1 to 20.

Answer 31

C) 20 to 100.

Question 32

What is the name of a self-report method used to measure subjective experiences such as pain and fatigue?
A) Composite scales
B) Dichotomous questions
C) Visual analog scales
D) Likert scales

Answer 32

C) Visual analog scales

Question 33

The social desirability response set bias is least likely to be a problem on scales incorporated into which?
A) Annonymous questionaires
B) Face-to-face interviews
C) Telephone interviews
D) All options are equally susceptible.

Answer 33

A) Annonymous questionaires

Question 34

Structured self-reports are susceptible to several types of response bias. What is the name of the bias that results when people agree with items, regardless of content?
A) Social desirability
B) Extreme response
C) Naysayers
D) Acquiescence

Answer 34

D) Acquiescence

Question 35

Structured self-reports are susceptible to several types of response bias. What is the name of the bias that results when people consistently select the “strongly agree” or “strongly disagree” response alternatives?
A) Social desirability
B) Extreme response
C) Nay-sayers
D) Acquiescence

Answer 35

B) Extreme response

Question 36

When an observer is not concealed, the observational data may be biased because of:
A) reactivity.
B) ethical problems.
C) lack of mobility.
D) acquiescence bias.

Answer 36

A) reactivity.

Question 37

When structured observation is used to collect data, researchers often use a category system to construct:
A) a rating scale.
B) an exhaustive system.
C) a nonexhaustive system.
D) a checklist.

Answer 37

D) a checklist.

Question 38

A researcher studying interactions among nursing home residents schedules 5-minute observations, with six periods of observation per hour. What sampling strategy is the researcher using?
A) Event sampling
B) Quota sampling
C) Time sampling
D) Consecutive sampling

Answer 38

C) Time sampling

Question 39

Which is an advantage of observation as a method of data collection in a study?
A) Participants enjoy being observed.
B) Participants can remain anonymous.
C) Observation is less costly than distributing questionnaires.
D) Observation directly captures people’s behaviours.

Answer 39

D) Observation directly captures people’s behaviours.

Question 40

Which statement about biophysiologic measures is true?
A) In vivo measurements are performed outside a participant’s body.
B) Biophysiologic instruments are more likely to provide valid measures of the target variables than self-reports.
C) Biophysiologic measures are less accurate and precise than composite scales.
D) Oxygen saturation is an example of an in vitro measurement.

Answer 40

B) Biophysiologic instruments are more likely to provide valid measures of the target variables than self-reports.

Question 41

Which statement is true?
A) Measurement involves assigning numbers to represent the amount of an attribute according to rules.
B) When researchers develop a new measure, they must learn what measurement rules apply to it.
C) Most measures of attributes of interest to nurse researchers are free from measurement error.
D) Evaluation of a new measure involves an assessment of 10 distinct measurement properties.

Answer 41

A) Measurement involves assigning numbers to represent the amount of an attribute according to rules.

Question 42

What is the discipline concerned with the theory and methods of measuring psychosocial constructs?
A) Bibliometrics
B) Sociometrics
C) Psychometrics
D) Econometrics

Answer 42

C) Psychometrics

Question 43

Which measurement property concerns the extent to which scores for an attribute are free from measurement error?
A) Validity
B) Psychometrics
C) Replication
D) Reliability

Answer 43

C) Replication

Question 44

Which occurs in an assessment of test–retest reliability?
A) Two different raters simultaneously use the same instrument to measure people.
B) A measure is administered once to a sample of people.
C) A measure is administered to the same people on two occasions.
D) Alternative versions of an instrument are administered to the same people.

Answer 44

C) A measure is administered to the same people on two occasions.

Question 45

A nurse researcher developed a new 10-item scale to measure resilience. The researchers evaluated whether all 10 items were measuring the same trait. Which was being assessed?
A) Interrater reliability
B) Internal consistency
C) Test–retest reliability
D) Content reliability

Answer 45

B) Internal consistency

Question 46

A nurse researcher develops a new scale to measure preparedness for caregiving among family members of palliative care patients. A panel of experts is convened to assess whether the items on the draft scale adequately reflect the construct. What type of validity is being assessed?
A) Content validity
B) Face validity
C) Criterion validity
D) Construct validity

Answer 46

A) Content validity

Question 47

A nurse researcher developed a new scale to measure cigarette dependence and calculates the correlation between scale scores and a gold standard, salivary cotinine levels. What type of validity is being assessed?
A) Content validity
B) Face validity
C) Criterion validity
D) Construct validity

Answer 47

C) Criterion validity

Question 48

A nurse researcher developed a new scale to measure the self-care behaviours of adults with type 2 diabetes. The validation effort included a test of the hypothesis that people with high levels of HbA1c have significantly lower scores on the self-care scale than those with lower levels of HbA1c. What type of validity is being assessed?
A) Content validity
B) Face validity
C) Criterion validity
D) Construct validity

Answer 48

D) Construct validity