Self report Flashcards
What are the types of self report?
Questionnaires
Interviews
What is an questionnaire?
Written methods of gathering data, which do not necessarily require the researcher to be present
What is an interview?
involve direct verbal questioning by the researcher and vary in terms of how structured questions are
What is a respondent?
Those who answer a questionnaire
What are questionnaires used to investigate?
The way people think and feel about a particular topic
What are open questions?
Do not suggest possible answers, but leave respondent to consider their own answer. There are no options to choose from.
E.g. What is your opinion about eating in classrooms?
What are closed questions?
A form of fixed choice questions where the respondent is asked to select an answer from 2 or more choices
E.G Do you think eating should be allowed in a classroom? Yes / No
What are the strengths of closed questions?
Easier and quicker for the P to respond
The data collected is easy to compare and analyse
What are the weaknesses of closed questions?
Can force Ps to select an option which isn’t true for them
Lacks reasons for why they selected the option they did
What are the strengths of open questions?
Provides more rich detailed data
Doesn’t force participants to give a particular response
What are the weaknesses of open questions?
Time consuming to complete by the P and for the researcher to analyse the responses collected
Responses may not be relevant to what the researcher was interested in
What are rating scales?
A way of collecting date where the respondent is required to mark how strongly they feel about a certain subject
What are the strengths of rating scales?
It gives the researcher an idea of how strongly a participant feels about something (It is more detailed than a simple yes or no answer.)
It still gives quantitative data that can be compared.
It is easily repeated.
What are the weaknesses of rating scales?
People might not be consistent in how they interpret the scale (low reliability)
Participants may just choose the middle option so they don’t look too extreme.
Rating scales still don’t give you an idea of WHY participants have chosen that option.
What are Likert scales?
Attitude scales in which the respondent is given a statement and asked to indicate the extent to which they agree or disagree with it
Providing an odd number scale is better
What is a standard response set?
a tendency for individuals to respond to questions or items in a systematic way, unrelated to the content of the questions, potentially skewing the results of surveys or tests.
E.g. If I have loads of similar looking scales, and you agree with the first few, you could easily find yourself always picking ‘agree’ on the scales
How do you avoid a response set?
Vary the statement wording so that some are positive and some are negative
What are sematic differentials?
These make use of polar opposites and respondents indicate where they would place their feelings in relation to the topic in question.
College
Big ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ Small
Quiet ____ ____ ____ ____ ____ Loud
What is an ethics statement?
informs participants of their rights such as being able to withdraw their data at any time from the research and checks that they give consent to take part.
What are advantages of questionnaires?
Can answer them more anonymously so more likely to get responses to embarrassing questions
Quicker to complete for participants (usually involve more closed questions)
Can collect a large amount of data by sending out to participants
Participants can take more time to consider responses
What are advantages of interviews?
Can ask follow up questions based on responses given
Can get more detailed answers to questions than questionnaires provide
You can build a rapport with interviewees, read their body language
What are disadvantages of questionnaires?
People may not return questionnaires leading to a low response rate
People may misunderstand questions or interpret them differently to how you intended (making results invalid)
What are disadvantages of interviews?
May no get full answers to questions
Can be more time consuming to complete
More difficult to analyse if open questions used
What are structured interviews?
Fixed predetermined questions – no room for follow up
What are semi-structured interviews?
Interviewer asks some pre-planned questions but then is able to ask follow up questions based on interviewee’s responsesW
What are unstructured interviews?
There is a topic but no fixed questions or ways of answering
What are the strengths of structured interviews?
Using the same questions means the interview is standardised and replicable as it can be repeated in the same way for each participant.
Reponses from each participant can be easily compared
What are the strengths of semi-structured interviews?
Allows the interviewer to use additional questions to seek clarification on a response, or to explore an interesting comment made during one of the set questions.
What are the strengths of unstructured interviews?
The interview allows for information to be gathered that might not be revealed from pre-determined questions.
It allows the interviewer to have the freedom to ask on the spot questions which could be relevant.
What are the weaknesses of structured interviews?
The interviewer cannot ask any addition questions. This may prevent them from seeking further clarification on a point or not following up on an interesting point.
What are the weaknesses of semi-structured interviews?
Although there is some flexibility the interview is still likely to be constrained around the pre-determined questions that are written.
Any additional questions not decided beforehand may vary from participant to participant – making it difficult to compare.
What are the weaknesses of unstructured interviews?
Difficult to compare responses from the different participants, as they may be asked very different questions from each other
How can you test the internal reliability of self reports?
split-half method
This involves splitting the questions in two (e.g. first half vs. second half, even vs. odd number questions)
Then comparing responses between the two halves to see if they are consistent
How can you test the external reliability of self-reports?
test-retest method
Giving the same questionnaire to participants at different points in time
If they respond in the same way, the results are consistent
A large number of questions are asked about the same thing improve or reduce reliability?
Improves it – this is a good way of testing if something really is true of the participant (as opposed to just asking about this trait or opinion once and potentially getting a ‘fluke’/untypical response)
A questionnaire is repeated with several different groups of people and similar results are obtained each time improve or reduce reliability?
Improves it – this helps to establish that the researcher has high external reliability as consistent findings are being found.
The way the questionnaire is administered means that some respondents complete it on their own while others
complete it in the company of their friends improves or reduces reliability?
Reduces it – there is no consistency between the participants in terms of their experience of how they completed the questionnaire
The questionnaire is sent out to a large number of people but the response rate is low,
meaning that very few
completed questionnaires are returned improves and reduces reliability?
Reduces it – not a large enough sample to establish a consistent effect
Unstructured interviews are used, meaning that different interviewees are asked
different questions.
improves or reduces reliability?
Reduces it – there is no consistency between participants in terms of their experience (therefore the results from one interview cannot easily be compared with those from another)
A questionnaire contains
ambiguous questions (i.e. they are open to more than one interpretation about what the questions are asking) improves or reduces reliability?
Reduces it – there will be inconsistency between participants with regard to what they think they have been asked, and therefore will respond to different questions based on their perceptions
The researcher compares the responses from the odd
numbered questions with those from the even-numbered questions. They find the
answers are very similar across the two halves of the
questionnaire/interview improves or reduces reliability?
Improves it – there is high split-half reliability which means that the questionnaire/ interview has internal reliability.
How does the questionnaire or interview containing leading questions (i.e. questions that lead the
participant to be more likely to give a particular answer) reduce validity?
It would mean that participants aren’t expressing their genuine views – instead, they are expressing the view they feel led towards
How does participants giving answers that they think will present them in a good light (i.e. they give ‘socially desirable’ answers) reduce validity?
Participants aren’t expressing their genuine views – instead, they are expressing the view that they think will make them look best
How does the questionnaire or structured interview containing forced choice questions in which the respondents must choose one item from the limited range available reduce validity?
Participants aren’t expressing their genuine views – what they are doing is expressing the view which is closest to their genuine view (although it may not be very close at all)
How does respondents try to work out the real aim of the researcher (i.e. respond to the demand characteristics of the study) and give the researcher the answers they think the
researcher wants reduce validity?
Participants aren’t expressing their genuine views – instead, they are expressing the view that they think the researcher is looking for (and which will be of most help to her with her research)
How does respondents lapsing into a
standard response set, giving the same answer to all
questions without really
thinking about what is being asked (e.g. always ticking
‘agree’ on a Likert scale in response to all statements) reduce validity?
Participants aren’t expressing their genuine views – instead, they are just giving answers without really thinking about what they are doing
How does respondents being asked to record their name on the
questionnaire or have it written down against their interview answers reduce validity?
Participants aren’t expressing their genuine views – as they will be aware that their responses can be traced back to them, they might ‘censor’ (or tone down) some of their more extreme views
How does data from open questions that requires a lot of analysis to group it together into
categories. There is the risk of researcher bias (i.e. the
researcher interpreting
responses in a way that
suggests they are supporting her theory) reduce validity?
The way the data is analysed may not reflect participants’ genuine views – instead, it may reflect what the researcher had been hoping the participants would say
What is nominal data?
A simple frequency headcount when data is put in a category (number of people who pass or fail a test).
What is ordinal data?
When data can be put into rank order e.g. number of words found in a word search (participants could be placed 1st, 2nd 3rd, etc. in order of who found the most words)
What is interval data?
Interval level data can be measured on a scale. (e.g. time taken to complete a task, distance covered, etc.) The intervals are known and equal- the difference between 1 minute and 3 minutes is always 2 minutes.
