Lecture 8 Flashcards
Hypotheses must be logical -> steps:
- Develop a hypothesis about a relationship
- Collect data
- Construct a statistic for that relationship ( t, F, chi-squared)
- Calculate the value of that statistic from the data,
- check the table
- If your result is unlikely to be caused by chance, you declare significance
Significant relationship
If there is enough chance that the value falls in the outer two tails of the distribution
Calculating the t-value using OLS
Y is your dependent variable, x independent with an error term
OLS
Ordinary least squared with particular assumptions least is minimal
Primary data
Collected by the researcher (survey, interview, experiment)
Secondary data
Existing data collected by another person (save time and money and non-obrustive, but not collected for the purpose of your study) also archival data
Dichotomous question
has two choices (a coded dummy variable)
nominal question
(non-ordered) multiple options, but no inherent order
ordinal question
ordered, multiple questions with an inherent hierarchy
Likert scale
an interval level ordinal question (5 to 7 points)
Question content what to ask and what is wrong
- Is the question necessary and useful?
- No double/mulitple-barreled questions (two questions in one)
- Do respondents have the needed knowledge?
- Can you make the question more specific or factual?
- How do you deal with sensitive questions?
- Take care of your wording ( not loaded, objective, etc.)
Common method bias
collecting data with a single method or source.
Solution: obtain x and y from different methods or sources, times/spaces
Self-serving bias
individual tendency to refer to internal attribution for their success and external attribution for their failure
Non-response bias
sustematic differences between respondents and non-respondents (solution: show that there are no differences)
- compare early and late respondents if you have no non-respondents data
Back translation
back translation is good for when things are lost in translation ( ask someone else to translate back and see if the message is the same)