observational designs

Question 1

what are behavioural categories?

Answer 1

when a target behaviour is broken down into components that are observable and measurable

Question 2

what is event sampling?

Answer 2

a target behaviour or event is first established then the researcher records this event every time it occurs

Question 3

what is time sampling?

Answer 3

a target individual or group is first established then the researcher records their behaviour in a fixed time frame (e.g. every 60 seconds)

Question 4

what must behavioural categories be in order to be considered operationalised

Answer 4

• must be objective
• must cover all possible component behaviours
• must be mutually exclusive (shouldn’t mark two categories at a time)