Self report techniques Flashcards
What is a questionnaire?
- A set of written questions that are used to assess a persons thoughts and experiences
- May be used as a part of experiment to assess the dependent variable
What is an open question?
Does not have a fixed range of answers and respondents are free to answer in any way they wish.
Tend to produce more qualitative data that contains a wide range of different answers
What is a closed question?
Has a fixed number of responses. These produce quantitative data and lack depth and detail
What are the different types of interview?
- structured interviews
- unstructured interviews
- semi - structured interviews
What are structured interviews?
- structured interviews are made up of pre - determined set of questions in a fixed order
What is an unstructured interview?
- works like a conversation, no set questions
- no general aim and a certain topic will be discussed
- interactions tends to be free flowing
What is a semi - structured interview?
- a list of questions that have been worked out in advanced but interviewers are free to ask follow up questions
Evaluate questionnaires?
S = Questionnaires are cost effective. Can gather large amounts of data quickly and can be distributed to large numbers of people. Straightforward to analyse
L = Answers may not be truthful. Respondents may be keen to present themselves in a positive light. This is a form of demand characteristics called social desirability bias. Questionnaires often produce response bias, for example participants may always click ‘yes’
Evaluate interviews?
- Structured interviews like questionnaires, are straightforward to replicate as it is in a standardised formats. The format also reduces differences between interviewers. However,structured interviews limit the richness of data collected.
- There is more flexibility with unstructured interviews as interviewers can follow up on questions and gain more insight
- However, there may be interviewer bias (where the expectations or opinions of the interviewer interferes with the judgment of the interviewee) and also unstructured interviews are harder to analyse
-there is also a risk of social desirability