Chapter 5 Flashcards
Descriptive research
Observation and description of a behavior, the situation it occurs in, or the individual exhibiting it
Purpose of descriptive research
Describe natural behaviors
Three advantages to descriptive research
Informative, starting point for IDing variables and building HCs that can be tested later using other methods, and it can be the only practical or ethical method
Two categories of descriptive research
Observational and field studies
Observational research
Observe in an unobtrusive manner
3 observational methods
Naturalistic, systematic naturalistic, and participant observation
Naturalistic observation
Observes a wide variety of behaviors in an unobtrusive manner
Systematic naturalistic observation
ID a particular behavior to observe
Participant observation
Researcher becomes a participating member of the group being observed
Advantage to observational designs
Behaviors are not influenced by reactivity or other demand characteristics
Disadvantages of observational designs
Descriptions are susceptible to experimenter expectations, limited in individuals we can find to observe (unrepresentative sample), only have verbal descriptions (qualitative data lacks precision and accuracy), no informed consent, little internal validity
Raters
People who are blind to the hypothesis and trained to use our scoring criteria
Multiple raters
More than one rater
Inter-rater reliability
The extent to which rates agree on the scores they assign to a participant’s behavior
Other observational research procedures
Archival research, ex post facto research, and case studies
Archival research
Source of data is written records
Disadvantages to archival research
Obtaining access to records may be difficult, records are not made with a researcher’s question in mind, and there are few control to prevent the record-keeper’s biases and errors
Advantages to archival research
Allows us to study behaviors that would otherwise be unobservable
Ex post facto research
A descriptive or experimental study conducted after the events of interest have occurred.
Disadvantages to ex post facto research
Obtain potentially unreliable data
Case study
In-depth study of one situation or “case”
Advantage of case studies
Provide an in-depth description
Disadvantage of case studies
Generalizability may be poor
Field survey
People complete a questionnaire/interview in a natural setting so that we may infer the responses we would see if we polled the population
Mailed survey
Useful when we need a larger sample and/or a lengthy questionnaire is being used
Telephone survey
Shorter and faster
Difficulty with mailed and phone surveys
Getting people to participate
Volunteer bais
Bias that arises from the particular people who participate in a study, volunteers tend to have a higher social status and intelligence
Two sampling techniques
Probability and nonprobabilty sampling
Probability sampling
Random sampling
Simple random sampling
Select participants so that all members of the pollution have an equal chance of being selected
Systematic random sampling
Every nth person is selected
Stratified random sampling
Randomly select form the important subgroups so that their representation in the sample in proportional to the population
Cluster sampling
Certain clusters/groups are randomly selected and all members of each group are observed
Nonprobability sampling
No random sampling
Convenience sampling
Study participants who are available
Quota sampling
Ensure the sample has the same percentage or each subgroup, but they are not randomly sampled
Snowball sampling
ID one participant, use him/her to find other potential participants, and ID others from them, etc…
Close-ended question
Researcher provides alternatives to choose from
Disadvantage of close-ended questions
Yield limited info
Open-ended question
Participant determines the alternatives to choose from and the response
Advantages to open-ended questions
Allow for a wide range of responses, researchers may discover new relevant variables, not limited to one perspective or phrasing
Disadvantages of open-ended questions
Requires research interpretation, scoring is susceptible to experimenter biases and expectations
Content analysis
Score a participant’s written/spoken answer by counting specified types of responses
Advantage of interviewers
Ensure participants complete the questions as asked; Interviewers can react to responses
Disadvantage of interviewers
May inadvertently heighten the demand characteristics of reactivity and social desirability
Structured interview
Participants are asked specific, pre-determined questions in a controlled manner
Unstructured interview
The researcher has a general idea of the open-ended questions that will be asked, but has the freedom to discuss and interact with the participant
Goal of question construction
Reliably and validly discriminate between participants on the variable being studied
Double-barrled question
Questions with more than one component
Leading question
Questions that communicate social desirability or experimenter expectancies
Barnum statements
Questions so global and vague that everyone would agree or select the same response
Response scale
Number and type of choices to provide for each question
Use even or odd umber of choices?
Even
Practice effects
Participants first find questions to be novel and react strongly then later become more comfortable or bored
Carry-over effects
Participants respond in a biased fashion to later questions because of earlier ones
How to deal with order effects
Provide practice questions
Counterbalance order effects (different orders for different participants)
Prevent response sets (vary question format to force the participant to think)
Use alternate forms
Alternate forms
Different versions of the same questionnaire
Catch trials
Catch participants who give no thought to the questions or answer randomly, create questions to which we know the truthful response or make the same question with answers in a different order
