Methods - Formal Assessment 1 Flashcards
What is the P.E.E set up for practical issues?
Point: A strength/ weakness of interviews/ questionnaires….
Evidence: Evidence/theory
Explanation: Why does the evidence support the point?
What is the P.E.E set up for ethical issues?
Point: An ethical issue with interviews/questionnaires…
Example: Example
Evidence: How can this be solved?
List three theoretical issues for questionnaires.
- Validity (accurate)
- Reliability (replicable)
- Representativeness (represents a wider society)
List three ethical issues with questionnaires.
- Right to withdraw
- Confidentiality
- Personal questions
List three practical issues with questionnaires.
- Low response rate
- Limited and superficial
- Biased samples
List four issues of validity within questionnaires
- Lying
- Forgetting
- Right ‘answerism’
- Not understanding the question
e. g m/c citizens potentially understand advanced vocab more in comparison to w/c
What type of question provides reliable and replicable data?
Close-ended questions
How can research be repeated when using a questionnaire?
By using an identical questionnaire.
- Same questions
- Same order
- Same answer choices
What makes questionnaires more reliable in comparison to interviews?
There is no researcher to influence participants answers.
What can make findings unrepresentative in questionnaires?
Low response rates
Why are questionnaires more representative?
Questionnaires are often large scale and thus more representative.
Why do the results of questionnaires have a better chance at being representative of a wider population?
Questionnaires can collect information from a large number of people, the results stand a better chance of being truly representative of the wider population in comparison to methods which study only very small numbers of people.
List seven features of structured interviews.
- Standardised
- Pre-set
- Less valid but more reliable
- Produce conclusions that are easy to quantify
- Detached
- Fixed questions
- Quantitative data (numbers)
List four practical issues for structured interviews:
Strengths:
- Higher response rate than questionnaires
- Easily quantified results
Weaknesses:
- More expensive than questionnaires
- False data (lying)
List four ethical issues for structured interviews:
- Pressure (to answer questions)
- Right to withdraw
- Stressful topics and harm
- Confidentiality
List nine features of unstructured interviews:
- Varied questions (or none at all)
- Discovery
- Require more analysis - Therefore less reliable
- More valid, accurate and detailed
- Used for sensitive topics
- Qualitative data - Information about qualities; information that can’t actually be measured
- Hard to analyse findings
- Interview bias
- Open-ended questions
List three practical issues of unstructured interviews:
- Time + money (can take several hrs limiting numbers)
- Training (b/g in sociology)
- Interpretational skills (rapport)
List three ethical issues of unstructured interviews:
- Pressure
- Right to withdraw
- Confidentiality
What is a semi-structured interview?
Involves some improvisation around questions e.g ‘how do you mean?’
What is a group interview?
Conversation with a group
Why are group interviews less common?
People either don’t speak or don’t shut up
List theoretical issues involving unstructured interviews (positivists and interpretivists)
Positivists:
- Prefer questionnaires + structured interviews
- Prefer quantitative data (easier to analyse)
- Reliable+representative data
- Generalises everyone
Interpretivists:
- Prefer participant observation+unstructured/semi-structured interviews
- Produce valid data
- Interested in meaning+valid in-depth data
- Qualitative data
List four general issues with interviews:
- Artificial e.g controlled setting. Good for reliability, bad for accuracy.
- Cultural differences e.g when studying other cultures
- Power inequalities e.g powerful interviewer vs powerless interviewee. unethical + affect validity.
- Biased and leading questions will affect validity e.g ‘do you agree?’
