Unit 4+5

Question 1

what do observational designs consist of?

Answer 1

researcher observing and systematically recording some particular behaviour for the purpose of better describing the behaviour in question
ex. how children interact at a playground
ex. how rats at a dump share food
ex. how sales influence shopping behaviour
ex. how females interact with males in a bar

Question 2

what are the two primary categories of observational research?

Answer 2

direct observation methods
indirect observation methods

Question 3

what are direct observation methods?

Answer 3

ex. people watching is direct observation however to make it scientific you must record data

Question 4

what are the two ways to directly observe?

Answer 4

without intervention
with intervention

Question 5

what is the difference between without intervention and with intervention?

Answer 5

with no intervention researchers interfere as little as possible with a participants behaviour and direct observation with intervention is when the researcher purposely alters some aspect of the environment

Question 6

what is a common type of direct observation without intervention?

Answer 6

naturalistic observation

Question 7

what is naturalistic observation/ field observation?

Answer 7

normally is a qualitative method based on systematic observations that involves observing subjects in their natural environment
sometimes a mixed method of quantitative and qualitative is used as well as quantitative
field notes are created and can include information about all aspects (ex. setting, patterns of personal relationships…)
informed consent is usually unnecessary

Question 8

what are limits to naturalistic observation?

Answer 8

cant be used to study all issues or phenomena
difficult to conduct (weird times)
interpreting the data is not simple

Question 9

what are the two key issues with naturalistic observation?

Answer 9

whether to actively participate in the situation you are studying or not participate and only observe
whether to conceal your purpose or presence from the other people in the setting (concealed observation)

Question 10

what is a common type of direct observation with intervention?

Answer 10

participant observer (they will have an active insider role)

Question 11

what is participant observer research?

Answer 11

the researcher is the participant and the observer roles. this type of research can be disguised (people dont know their behaviour is being recorded) or undisguised (people know that their behaviours are being watched and recorded)

Question 12

how do participants react to concealed observation?

Answer 12

results in less participant reactivity
whether to conceal or not depends on ethical and on the nature of the the particular group being studied
they normally will not disclose their purpose of the experiment

Question 13

disguised participant observer research (concealed observation) minimizes the problem of reactivity, what is reactivity?

Answer 13

principle that states that participants or subjects respond differently when they know they are being observed
also called the hawthorne effect (because reactivity was first noticed in the hawthorne plant)

Question 14

how can we minimize reactivity?

Answer 14

concealed observation
nonreactive or unobstructive operationalizations
allow time for people to become used to the presence of the observer and any recording equipment

Question 15

what is participant reactivity?

Answer 15

the presence of the observer can affect peoples behaviours to cover this up we can use concealed observation (ex. one way mirrors, hidden cameras)

Question 16

what is systematic observation?

Answer 16

the careful observation of one or more specific behaviours in a particular setting (setting is often created by the researcher)
used more often with quantitative approach
use a coding scheme often

Question 17

what is a coding scheme?

Answer 17

a simple system researchers use to record, categorize and quantify qualitative observations to fit the needs of the particular study
ex. conversations coded for (1) topic, social or research related and (2) gender of the person they were speaking to. this study found that faculty were less likely to discuss research with female colleagues

Question 18

sometimes researchers use coding schemes that already exist, what is the facial action coding system?

Answer 18

way to categorize subtle, fleeting, facial muscle movements

Question 19

sometimes researchers use coding schemes that already exist, what is the mealtime interaction coding system?

Answer 19

codes interactions of family members during mealtimes

Question 20

what is an independent variable and dependent variable?

Answer 20

independent variable is considered to be the cause (the independent variable causes changes in the dependent variable, we manipulate independent variables)
dependent variable is considered to be the effect (participants response to the manipulated variable)

Question 21

what are the three requirements of cause and effect?

Answer 21

temporal precedence (causal variable must come first in the temporal order of events, then followed by the effect)
covariation between the two variables (changes in one variable must be accompanied by changes in the other)
eliminate plausible alternative explanations for the observed relationship
(if an experiment has all three of these, it is considered to have high validity)

Question 22

how does the experimental method rule out alternative explanations?

Answer 22

by using random assignment (ex. using a list randomizer and large sample)
different forms of experimental control

Question 23

what is a field experiment?

Answer 23

not the same as field observation (because field observation involves intervention). in field experiments the independent variable is manipulated in a natural setting out in the real world (ex. shopping mall, street corners)

Question 24

what are advantages and disadvantages to field experiments?

Answer 24

advantage is that it takes place in a natural context, disadvantage is that the researcher loses the ability to directly control many aspects of the situation

Question 25

what is a case study?

Answer 25

provides a detailed description of an individual person (ex. clinical psychologist) or setting (ex. neighbourhood, school, business)

Question 26

when is the case study method useful?

Answer 26

when an individual possesses a particularly rare condition, in these cases studying more than one person might not even be possible
ex. a man in a test study was able to memorize long passages super easy
ex. the study on the twins were ones penis got cut off by accident and was raised as a girl

Question 27

what is psychobiography?

Answer 27

a researcher applies psychological theory to explain the life of an individual usually in important historical figure

Question 28

what is a causal claim?

Answer 28

a claim of the form “A was a cause of B”

Question 29

what is the difference between an experimental method and a non- experimental method?

Answer 29

non- experimental: relationships are studied by measuring or observing the all the variables of interest while experimental methods involve direct manipulation of one variable, control of several other variables and measurement of the outcome variable.

Question 30

how would a researcher study the relationship between exercise and happiness using a non- experimental method?

Answer 30

ask people to report their exercise habits and current happiness

Question 31

why are both the non- experimental and experimental research methods necessary?

Answer 31

to fully understand behaviour

Question 32

what is the best method to use, experimental or non- experimental?

Answer 32

a mixture of both (the strengths of one method may be able to compensate for the weaknesses in another)

Question 33

what is the downfall of the non- experimental method?

Answer 33

cannot tell us whether two things are causally related. there are 3 options, A might cause B, B might cause A or there might be a third variable C (this is the third variable problem)
ex. exercise causes increased happiness, happiness causes increased exercise, higher income results in more exercise and increased happiness

Question 34

what is a confounding variable?

Answer 34

variables that we are not interested in but are intertwined with our variable of interest

Question 35

what is the difference between a third variable (lurking variable) and a confounding variable?

Answer 35

lurking variables are not included in the study, whereas confounding variables are included in the study, but their effects are not properly accounted for

Question 36

what can help to address the third variable problem?

Answer 36

partial correlation (compare calculated partial correlation with original correlation

Question 37

what is structural equation modelling (SEM)?

Answer 37

examines models that specify a set of relationshups among many variables represented in a path diagram
based on correlation so cant determine a causal association

Question 38

waht are inferential statistics?

Answer 38

make inferences about the population from which the sample was drawn using sample data

Question 39

what are three different relationships for a variable?

Answer 39

positive linear relationship
negative linear relationship
curvilinear relationship

Question 40

what is a positive linear relationship?

Answer 40

an increase in one variable causes an increase in the other
ex. narcissism increases with increased time spent on facebook

Question 41

what is a negative linear relationship?

Answer 41

increase in one variable causes a decrease in the other
ex. as satisfaction with a therapist increased, the number of students with depressive symptoms decreased

Question 42

what are two things to look for when looking at correlation (r)?

Answer 42

restriction of range (important that the researcher sample from the full range of possible scores)
curvilinear relationship (r coefficient cant detect these relationships, only linear relationships)

Question 43

what is the squared correlation coefficient? why do we use it?

Answer 43

r squared
to get the proportion of variance being explained

Question 44

what is a curvilinear relationship?

Answer 44

increases in one variable cause increases and decreases in another variable
ex. teachers report that they are effective at engaging their students (increase) but eventually it leads to a decrease. (this would be shown as an inverted U relationship)

Question 45

what is a situational variable?

Answer 45

describes characteristics of a situation or environment to which the participant is exposed (ex. number of people around you while writing a test)
measured in any design

Question 46

what is a response variable?

Answer 46

responses or behaviours of participants, such as reaction time in response to a stimulus, performance on a task and emotional reactions
measured in experimental or non- experimental

Question 47

what is a participant variable?

Answer 47

describes a characteristic that individuals bring with them to a study (cultural background, age, intelligence, personality traits)

Question 48

what is more abstract, a hypothesis or a prediction?

Answer 48

hypothesis

Question 49

when are self report measures used?

Answer 49

to study personality traits, attitudes, evaluations, motivations and preferences

Question 50

what are operationalizations?

Answer 50

variables must be translated into concrete and specific forms (reliability and validity are important for operationalizations)
ex. aggression must be defined in terms of the specific method that will be used to measure or manipulate it
ex. intelligence might be operationalized as academic average

Question 51

what is the correlational method?

Answer 51

methods in which variables are observed but not manipulated (NOT the same as the correlational statistic)

Question 52

what are two types of indirect observational methods?

Answer 52

archival research
physical traces

Question 53

what is archival research? what types of information is contained with archival records?

Answer 53

documents (or records) that can be found at any university libraries, government buildings and other institutions
information in archival records may include: data on birth weights and rates, death rates and causes of death, weather reports and crime rates

Question 54

what are three sources of archival research?

Answer 54

census data in the form of statistical records (ex. stat canada)
survey archives
written records and mass media

Question 55

what are written records?

Answer 55

stored documents (diaries and letters)

Question 56

what are mass media records?

Answer 56

books
magazine articles
movies
television programs
newspapers
websites

Question 57

what are some problems with archival research?

Answer 57

bias can creep into findings from selective deposit (occurs when archival research is established and data could have been altered in some biased fashion) and selective survival (how archives survive over time)

Question 58

archival research involves content analysis, what is it?

Answer 58

systematic analysis of existing archives such as written documents and mass media records like movies and television shows

Question 59

what are the 3 challenges associated with the use of archival data?

Answer 59

the desired records may be difficult to obtain (data could be owned by companies for ex.)
cant control what data were collected or how they were recorded
its non experimental so we cannot make causal claims about these associations

Question 60

how do you avoid bias in content analysis?

Answer 60

classification and evaluation of the archival data should have two people or judges trained on the methods to be used in data classification and evaluation, both judges then code the archival data independently, the findings are then compared which gives an indication of reliability, reliability is high if the observers record the same or similar results on given behaviours, if reliability is high then there is little bias in the archival data

Question 61

what are physical traces?

Answer 61

physical evidence left behind by people or animals to study behaviour
ex. graffiti in school bathrooms
ex. garbage people throw away
ex. bear dung or scratches on a tree

Question 62

what is a population?

Answer 62

a set of people of interest to the researcher (ex. eligable

Question 63

what is a sample?

Answer 63

group that is selected to represent the population

Question 64

what is a confidence interval?

Answer 64

a way to quantify uncertainty that surrounds an estimate
gives information about how much error likely exists

Question 65

why is a larger sample size better?

Answer 65

reduces measurement error
reduces the size of the confidence interval

Question 66

what is a probability sample?

Answer 66

each member of the population has a known and specific probability of being chosen

Question 67

what are the 3 methods of probability sampling?

Answer 67

simple random sampling
stratified random sampling
cluster sampling

Question 68

what is simple random sampling?

Answer 68

if every member of the population has an equal chance of being selected into the sample and every possible combination of those members also has an equal chance

Question 69

consider that the entire student body at U of M is our
population. Which of the following three procedures best describes a simple random sample?
 Dr. X’s sample includes 100 students from her Distance Education class and 40 students from
her on-campus class.
 Dr. Y goes to the year-end Commerce party and samples 200 people.
 Dr. Z puts each student’s name in a big hat (30,000 student’s names in the hat), mixes them
with her hand, and draws 150 names from the hat.

Answer 69

Dr. Z

Question 70

how might simple random sampling not be random

Answer 70

because it might not be very representative of the population as there may not be much variation
ex. out of the 150 names in dr. Z hat 120 of them may have been male and only 30 female (not so random) to deal with this problem we perform a stratified random sample

Question 71

what is a stratified random sample?

Answer 71

researcher divides the population into subpopulations (strata) and then draws a simple random sample from each strata
ex. divide u of m population by males and females and take a random sample from each of the strata

Question 72

what is cluster sampling or multistage sampling?

Answer 72

used when you know very little about the population
identify clusters of individuals and take a simple random sample of these clusters, if they take a sample of that cluster thats when it becomes multistage
ex. researcher wants to study the political attitudes of canadians, first they might divide canada by postal code and select a simple random sample of postal codes, next they might divide selected postal codes by street names and select a random sample of streets, next they might select houses on the street

Question 73

how do researchers achieve representative samples of behaviour in observational research?

Answer 73

they use a combination of time sampling, situation sampling and non- probability sampling

Question 74

what is time sampling?

Answer 74

making observations of behaviour at different time periods in order to obtain more representative samples of the behaviour of interest (time periods are chosen either systematically or in a random fashion)

Question 75

what is situation sampling?

Answer 75

observing the same behaviour in many different situations (increases ability to generalize) in order to obtain a more representative sample (allows researchers to determine if the behaviour of interest changes as a function of the environmental context)

Question 76

what is a non- probability sample?

Answer 76

dont know the probability of any particular member of the population being chosen

Question 77

what are implications about non probability sampling?

Answer 77

generalizability of any results based on the sample

Question 78

what are the 3 types of non probability sampling?

Answer 78

convenience sampling/ haphazard sampling
purposive sampling
quota sampling

Question 79

what is haphazard sampling?

Answer 79

POPULAR SAMPLING TECHNIQUE where participants are recruited wherever you can find them. presents bias (ex. doesnt represent all students at u of m)
ex. stand outside a building at school and ask people that walk by your question (people that dont walk by this building wont have a chance to answer the question)

Question 80

what is purposive sampling?

Answer 80

sampling for a specific purpose to obtain a sample of people who meet some predetermined criterion
ex. instead of sampling every person who walks by, only ask people who are men under age 30 the question as they walk by

Question 81

what is quota sampling?

Answer 81

similar to stratified sampling but without randomness
ex. you want your sample to be 19% first years, 23% second years, 26% third years, 22% fourth years and 10% graduate students. quota sampling would ensure you have these percentages but would collect data using convenience sampling techniques

Question 82

what is a measurment?

Answer 82

process of assigning numbers and thus the properties of the number system to events according to a predetermined set of rules
involves two parts: the rules or the procedure that are used and the scale that is created

Question 83

what are 4 types of scales?

Answer 83

nominal scales
ordinal scales
interval scales
ratio scales

Question 84

what are nominal scales?

Answer 84

the most basic scale that uses simple qualitative (no numeric values) differences in the variables being measured thus, numbers are assigned to groups or categories (the only numbers in this scale type are labels that refer to people or data NOT numeric calculations)
ex. study of what countries people are from
ex. two kinds of therapies for depression
Appropriate statistics: Frequencies and chi-square

Question 85

what is an ordinal scale?

Answer 85

allows us to order the levels of the variable in terms of a rank
ex. top ten list
Appropriate statistics: percentiles, correlation, Mann-Whitney U test

Question 86

what do ordinal scales indicate?

Answer 86

an individuals or objects value based on its relationship to others in the group as the numbers in this scale type have a meaning within the group
ex. gold, silver, bronze (gold silver and bronze provides no information about the group)
Appropriate statistics: percentiles, correlation, Mann-Whitney U test

Question 87

what is an interval scale?

Answer 87

the difference between the numbers on the scale are equal in size
we cant use ratios with intervals, for example, we cant say 20 C is twice as much as 10 C because temperature can also be recorded in fahrenheit and 68 F (20 C) is not twice as warm as 50 F (10 C)
ex. IQ scores, temperature in celsius
ex. difference between 90 and 95 is the same as 115 to 120

Question 88

how is an interval scale an ordinal scale and nominal scale combined?

Answer 88

because it has magnitude (ordinal scale) but we also know exactly how much larger or smaller things are (nominal)
ex. if you score 80/100 on a test and bob scores 12/100 on the same test, you scored 68 points greater than bobs score

Question 89

what does it mean that interval scales are assigned an arbitrary zero (true zero)?

Answer 89

ex. when its 0 degrees celsius it doesnt mean that theres no temperature outside
ex. if you score 80 on a math test and bob scores 20 on the same math test, it doesnt mean that you are four times as good as bob at math
ex. rating scale of extraversion from 1 to 7, we cannot say that the person who scored 6 is twice as extraverted as teh person who scored 3 because there is no absolute zero that indicates an absence of a trait

Question 90

what are ratio scales?

Answer 90

a combination of interval scales, ordinal scales and nominal scales, except there is a true zero, comparisons can be made
ex. if nate steps on the scale weighs 90kg and you weigh 30kg, nate is 3 times my weight
Appropriate statistics: mean, median, mode, standard deviation, correlation, ratios, t-test, ANOVA

Question 91

what is a frequency distribution?

Answer 91

indicates the number of participants who receive or select each possible score on a variable
can be created for variables using any scale of measurement

Question 92

what are the are different types of graphs that are used to depict frequency distributions?

Answer 92

bar graphs
pie charts
histograms/ normal distribution
frequency polygons

Question 93

what are bar graphs used for?

Answer 93

for nominal categories (not continuous) comparing group means, percentages
ex. individuals choose one of five responses to the given question “ which of the following problems do you consider to be the most serious?”. the x axis would be the 5 options and the y axis would be the percentage of people.

Question 94

when are pie charts useful?

Answer 94

when representing data on a nominal scale
can only be used if the sum of the individual parts add up to a meaningful whole
used in applied research reports, newspapers, magazines

Question 95

what are histograms?

Answer 95

bars that all touch each other (because it uses a continuous variable) normally in the form of a bell curve

Question 96

when are histograms used?

Answer 96

used for a continuous variable. values along the x axis are continuous and show increasing amounts of a variable (ex. blood pressure, number of correct responses)

Question 97

what is an example of a histogram?

Answer 97

normal distribution: majority of scores cluster around the mean,

Question 98

what is a frequency polygon?

Answer 98

an alternative to histograms
helpful when you want to examine frequencies for multiple groups simultaneously
(looks like a line graph, with a line for each value being measured)
ex. when looking at the age of respondent from mexico compared to australia, mexico would be orange and australia would be blue for ex

Question 99

what is a descriptive statistic?

Answer 99

when you calculate statistics to describe or summarize data

Question 100

what are two main types of descriptive statistics?

Answer 100

measures of central tendency
measures of variability

Question 101

what is a measure of central tendency?

Answer 101

a statistic that tells you what the scores are like as a whole or how people scored on average

Question 102

what are the 3 measures of central tendency?

Answer 102

mean
median
mode

Question 103

when is mean used? what scale

Answer 103

when wanting to find the average
when using interval or ratio scale
very susceptible to outliers

Question 104

when is median used? what scale?

Answer 104

ordinal scale
continuous

Question 105

what is mode?

Answer 105

most frequent score

Question 106

when is mode used? what scale?

Answer 106

when deciding what is most popular
interval
ratio
ordinal

Question 107

what is a measure of variability?

Answer 107

amount of spread in a distribution of scores for continuous variables (interval or ratio scales)

Question 108

what are two common measures of variability?

Answer 108

standard deviation (small when values are close to the mean) (most common)
range

Question 109

what are the two types of data analysis?

Answer 109

quantitative (when data varies in numerical amount, requires statistical analysis and numerical data)
qualitative (cannot be numerically manipulated (ex. single, married, divorced))

Question 110

how can interobserver reliability be calculated?

Answer 110

(number of times two observers agree)/ (number of opportunities to agree) x 100

Question 111

can qualitative research be summarized using statistics?

Answer 111

NO (qualitative research conclusions are based on investigative interpretation of the data and very little statistical calculations are involved

Question 112

what are the two different ways to describe how qualitative variables (nominal data) are related?

Answer 112

comparing group percentages
comparing group means/ averages

Question 113

what is a common way to graph nominal data?

Answer 113

bar graph
line graph

Question 114

what is something to watch out for with bar graphs?

Answer 114

look at the y axis to see what the values are. many politicians trick readers by making their y axis appear more dramatic than it should (ex. making y axis 7 to 9 instead of 1-9)

Question 115

what is effect size?

Answer 115

a general term for size, amount or strength and helps us interpret how large our effects are

Question 116

when comparing two groups on their responses to a continuous variable what is an appropriate effect size?

Answer 116

cohens d (difference in means between two groups standardized by expressing it in units of standard deviation)
d of 1 indicates that the means are 1 standard deviation apart
d of 0.2 indicates that means are separated by 0.2 standard deviations
smallest d value is 0 which indicates no effect

Question 117

what is a mediating variable?

Answer 117

psychological process that helps to explain the relationship between two other variables

Question 118

what is the pearson correlation coefficient?

Answer 118

a measure of the relationship or association between two quantitative variables measured on the same person or thing using a range from -1 to +1 (r= 0 means the variables are unrelated)

Question 119

what are the two properties of correlation?

Answer 119

direction of the correlation (positive or negative)
strength of the relationship

Question 120

how do we determine the direction of correlation?

Answer 120

using scatterplots.
positive relationship is when both variables are increasing, negative relationship is when one variable is increasing and the other is decreasing, if theres no specific pattern then the relationship is zero

Question 121

waht is good about scatterplots?

Answer 121

allow us to detect outliers (outliers may be data entry error or it might be a real outlier point)

Question 122

how do we know the strength of the relationship?

Answer 122

by using regression equation (Y= a+bX), the closer r is to -1 or +1 the stronger the relationship. it summarizes all the data points
ex. r= -0.95 is a stronger relationship than r= +0.94

Question 123

what is multiple correlation?

Answer 123

represented as R
correlation between a combined set of predictor variables and a single criterion variable
generates a stronger relation

Question 124

what is multiple regression?

Answer 124

examines unique relationships between each predictor and the criterion
accommodates more than one predictor to predict the criterion variable

Question 125

when do researchers use multiple regression?

Answer 125

to study basic research topics

Question 126

what is a limitation of correlation?

Answer 126

1. dont allow us to draw cause- and- effect conclusions about the studied variables (even if variables are highly correlated they might not be causally related)
   ex. male prisoners that watch porn are highly correlated (r= +0.8) to violence towards women, but there may be a third variable like childhood abuse that is making them correlate
2. which comes first?
   ex. we couldn’t say that prisoners violent attitudes towards women caused these men to view pornography
3. participants are not randomly assigned to an experimental or control condition

Question 127

what is a spurious relationship?

Answer 127

make it clear that correlation cannot imply causation
ex. sales of ice cream and the number of shark attacks on swimmers are correlated

Question 128

what are surveys often used for?

Answer 128

used to gather large amounts of data about information people provide about themselves

Question 129

what are two forms of surveys?

Answer 129

questionnaires (personal administration to groups or individuals, mail surveys, internet surveys)
interviews (face to face, telephone, focus group)

Question 130

what is a focus group?

Answer 130

a group of 6- 10 people is gathered, open ended questions are asked and everyone must respond, its costly (need an incentive for ppl to show up), time consuming, provides lots of info on one topic

Question 131

what are advantages and disadvantages to questionnaires?

Answer 131

advantages: low cost (can be online surveys), allow respondent to be anonymous,
disadvantages: respondents must be attentive enough to complete them honestly, low response rate in mail surveys

Question 132

advantages and disadvantages to interviews

Answer 132

advantages: higher response rates, interviewer can clarify questions for the respondent,
disadvantages: interviewer bias (interviewer influence the respondents answers),

Question 133

what are tests and inventories often used for?

Answer 133

to measure some specific characteristic or trait possessed by an individual

Question 134

why are surveys and questionnaires popular for psychologists?

Answer 134

easy to conduct
can gather lots of data in a short amt of time
versatile (can gather info on any topic)
can provide a snapshot of how a particular group of people think and behave at a given point in time
used for experimental research

Question 135

what is a panel study/ longitudinal study?

Answer 135

when the same people are tracked and surveyed at two or more points in time

Question 136

what is the downfall to survey research?

Answer 136

response bias (people need to provide truthful and accurate answers)

Question 137

what is a response set?

Answer 137

a tendency to respond to all questions from a particular perspective or in a particular way rather than provide answers directly related to the questions themselves

Question 138

what are the two types of surveys and questionnaires?

Answer 138

descriptive surveys
analytical surveys

Question 139

what are descriptive surveys?

Answer 139

provide nominal data that allows you to determine the percentage of the population that holds a certain view

Question 140

what are analytical surveys?

Answer 140

generate nominal, ordinal and interval data
descriptive and try to determine how particular variables are related to one another

Question 141

what are the 6 steps to build a good questionnaire, survey, test or inventory?

Answer 141

determine the information you need and how you will get it
determine the style of questions you should use
create the specific items to be included in the survey or questionnaire
pilot the survey or test items and get a second opinion
determine the relevant demographic variables
write instructions and administration procedures

Question 142

what are the three general types of content measured by survey questions?

Answer 142

attitudes and beliefs (how you feel about issues)
facts and demographics (indicate things they know to be true about themselves and their situation)
behaviours (things you have done in the past or plan to do in future)

Question 143

what are the two types of questions you could use for a good questionnaire, survey, test or inventory?

Answer 143

open- ended (answers will be in their own words; constitute qualitative data)
closed- ended (answers are limited)

Question 144

what are different types of close- ended questions?

Answer 144

yes- no questions (statistically: frequency or percentages)
forced choice or forced alternate questions (force participants to choose between two options)
multiple choice questions
likert scale questions (rating scales, measure the magnitude of an opinion) can calcualte the mean for the data

Question 145

when using scales for questionnaires theres scales that are fully labelled, and scales that only have the lowest option (1) and highest option (5) labelled, what is the issue with these?

Answer 145

fully labelled is better however, sometimes people use the middle of the scale if they dont know how to respond, so it is recommended to also have an “idk box”

Question 146

what is a graphic rating scale?

Answer 146

when respondents need to make a mark along a line that has descriptions at each end (lowest and highest ends)

Question 147

what is a semantic differential scale?

Answer 147

way to measure the meaning that people ascribe to concepts, respondents rate concepts based on a continuum spanning two adjectives (one at each end, ex. bad ——–good)

Question 148

semantic differential scales are rated along 3 basic dimensions, what are they?

Answer 148

evaluation
activity
potency

Question 149

what is a non- verbal scale?

Answer 149

only using diagrams (used for kids)

Question 150

disadvantages of open- ended questions?

Answer 150

too broad or too simplistic answers
answers are hard to deal with statistically bc you have to decode their answers

Question 151

disadvantages of closed- ended questions?

Answer 151

difficult to create the questions
participants might not agree with any options you give (miss out on data)
topic youre studying may not be able to be reduced to a few choices no matter how thought out the choices are

Question 152

what are some guidelines to follow when writing the survey or questionnaire? step 3

Answer 152

attempt to address only a single issue per question
use vocabulary appropriate for participants (simple)
put more interesting questions at the beginning
avoid bias (loaded questions)
avoid negative wording
for mc make all your alternatives clear

Question 153

what is a double barrelled question?

Answer 153

a question that asks two things at once (AVOID THIS)

Question 154

what is inattentive responding?

Answer 154

when people provide answers without even really thinking about them. someone who is not paying attention may just agree to all the questions (called yea saying) or may disagree to all the questions (called nay saying)
to solve this, the person asking questions could ask a question that requests a particular response (for this question answer is d)

Question 155

what is social desirability?

Answer 155

a type of response set
its when an individual answers the way they think “most people” would respond

Question 156

what does piloting the test or survey mean?

Answer 156

giving it to a small group of participants and asking for feedback about the survey or test after getting feedback you can change some of the options to questions or change questions entirely
also get someone in the psychological field to look at it to ensure you and the participants didnt miss anything

Question 157

what are demographic variables?

Answer 157

questions about the characteristics of the participants that will take your survey
ex. their annual income, gender, age, height…

Question 158

what are some things to keep in mind when writing instructions for the survey (or test) participants?

Answer 158

be specific and concise
put instructions at beginning of survey
indicate how participants should respond to questions (circle the answer, highlight), encourage honest answering

Question 159

what are some things to keep in mind when writing instructions for the survey (or test) administrators?

Answer 159

prep a script for the administrator to read to the participants
tell administrator how many people will be taking the survey
be specific and concise with instructions
required equipment (ex. privacy needs, quiet, chairs, tables, desks…)
specify time limitations

Question 160

why do we go through so much trouble developing a survey or test?

Answer 160

to ensure reliability and validity

Question 161

reliability is super important for measurement. any measurement includes two components, what are they?

Answer 161

a true score (the persons actual level of the variable of interest(not the score they get on the measure of that variable)
measurement error (any contributor to a measures score that is not based on the actual level of the variable of interest)
ex. for a reactivity test if you had to press a certain key when you hear a certain sound, if you press the wrong key then press the right key that would be measurement error

Question 162

what is reliability?

Answer 162

consistency of a measure (if highly reliable you should get around the same result)
ex. if you were to give the survey to the same people for a second time, all the answers should be the same, if the answers are not the same then the test is not reliable or accurate

Question 163

what are the 4 main strategies to measure reliability?

Answer 163

test- retest reliability
alternate forms reliability
internal consistency reliability (type of internal consistency reliability is split half reliability)
inter- rater reliability

Question 164

what is test- retest reliability?

Answer 164

when a survey developer gives the same survey to the same group of participants on two different occasions (could be in a couple years or hours) scores from each test are then compared (survey is reliable if correlation is large and positive)

Question 165

what would you expect as the time interval between test administration increases?

Answer 165

decrease in reliability because people change drastically over long periods of time

Question 166

practice or carry- over effects are two concerns of test- retest reliability, what is it?

Answer 166

the benefits participants obtain from already having seen a survey or questionnaire
ex. get given a test, in a couple days you retest, your scores will be better the second time around

Question 167

to minimize carry over effects of reliability, what is an alternative reliability method we could use?

Answer 167

alternate forms reliability

Question 168

what is alternate forms reliability?

Answer 168

when survey developers produce two highly similar forms of the test, then correlate the scores on one test with the scores on the other test to give a measure of reliability
does not eliminate the carry over effect because participants will remember the types of questions that were asked the first time, thus we use consistency reliability

Question 169

what is internal consistency reliability?

Answer 169

examines how successful the different items in a scale are at measuring the same construct or variable (when people respond similarly across these different attempts it suggests that the measure is reliable)
measure the relationship (correlation) between each and every individual item on any survey or questionnaire

Question 170

why is internal consistency reliability such a good method?

Answer 170

because it eliminates or reduces:
- the need for two administrations of your survey
- the difficulty of developing another form
- carry over and practice effects
- changes that may occur in your participants over time

Question 171

what is cronbachs alpha?

Answer 171

a statistic used as an indicator for internal consistency
each item on a test or survey is compared to every other item on the test or survey, this produces inter- item correlations the average of the inter- item correlations gives the value of cronbachs alpha (values of cronbachs alpha that are higher than 0.7 suggest that your test is reliable)

Question 172

what is split half reliability?

Answer 172

a form of internal consistency
give a survey or questionnaire to a group of participants, once they have taken the survey randomly split the survey in half so you essentially have two surveys. compare the two surveys for each participant and estimate the reliability of the test

Question 173

what is sampling error?

Answer 173

differences between what is present in a population and what is present in a sample

Question 174

why is split half reliability not as reliable?

Answer 174

because when you divide a survey it decreases its reliability

Question 175

what formula can be used to estimate split half reliability and how much a surveys reliability will increase or decrease?

Answer 175

The spearman- brown formula

Question 176

what is inter- rater reliability?

Answer 176

raters observe behaviours and make ratings or judgments. high inter- rater reliability is obtained when most of the observations for two or more raters results in the same judgment

Question 177

what is validity?

Answer 177

when a test actually measures what it says it is supposed to measure
ex. if you want to measure fear of heights, you cant just weigh the person and say thats a measure of fear those results would not be valid
a study has high validity when it is well designed

Question 178

what is external validity?

Answer 178

the extent to which results can be generalized from the sample to the population from which it is drawn (1. randomly sample from a pop. that contains all people of interest, 2. contact selected people)

Question 179

what is sampling frame?

Answer 179

actual population of people (or clusters of people) from which a random sample will be drawn (often a subset of the population of interest)
ex. if you define your population of interest as “residence of saskatoon” the sampling frame may be based on a list of home telephone numbers that you will use (not everyone has a home phone)

Question 180

what is a weakness of the split half method?

Answer 180

reliability can change depending on how you split the test (higher split is higher correlation value)

Question 181

what are the 4 types of validity?

Answer 181

face validity
content validity
construct validity
criterion- related validity (or predictive and concurrent validity)

Question 182

what is face validity?

Answer 182

only involves judgment, the measure appears on teh “face of it”
does not tell us about what a test actually measures and instead refers to how test takers perceive the attractiveness/ appropriateness of a test

Question 183

what does it mean if a test is perceived not to have face validity?

Answer 183

test takers might hurry through a test and take it less seriously by undermining the usefulness of the test

Question 184

what is content validity?

Answer 184

the more representative the tests content is to the thing that is being measured (ex. depression) the greater the content validity of the test

Question 185

how would you know if a test has content validity?

Answer 185

1. research the thing being measured (ex. research methods)
2. through the research you discover that research methods are made up of 4 topic areas, each topic area weighs differently (more or less importance)
3. you discover that topic 1 is 40% importance, topic 2 is 30% importance, topic 3 is 20% importance and topic 4 is 10% importance
4. within the test if 40% of the test is topic 1, 30% is topic 2, 20% is topic 3 and 10% is topic 4 than we can be sure that the test demonstrates content validity

Question 186

what does face validity and content validity have in common?

Answer 186

both focus on assessing whether the content of a measure reflects the meaning of the construct being measured

Question 187

what is construct validity?

Answer 187

extent to which a test measures some theoretical construct (construct is something that exists in the theoretical sense) ex. we cannot see shyness

Question 188

what are the two ways of gathering evidence for construct validity of a test?

Answer 188

theoretical evidence
psychometric or statistical evidence

Question 189

what is theoretical evidence?

Answer 189

proposes an experimental hypothesis using the test as a measure of the construct in question, if the test is a valid measure of the construct then test scores should support the experimental hypothesis

Question 190

what is convergent validity?

Answer 190

when a test has construct validity then it should produce scores that correlate strongly with other tests that measure the same construct
high correlations

Question 191

what is discriminant validity?

Answer 191

opposite of convergent validity
when a test has construct validity and does not correlate well with other test scores that measure an unrelated construct (ex. r=0.09)

Question 192

what is criterion- related validity?

Answer 192

if the test correlates well with seperate, independent behaviours that are associated with the construct then it is said to have criterion- related validity

Question 193

when is criterion validity important?

Answer 193

when studying measures designed to improve our ability to make predictions about different behaviours

Question 194

what are the two main methods used to determine the criterion- related validity of a test?

Answer 194

predictive method
concurrent method

Question 195

what is the predictive method?

Answer 195

give the test to two large groups of people, their scores are held for a predetermined amt of time, when the time is done the same people are measured on specific behaviours (predicted by the test), test scores are then correlated with criterion scores (if correlate + then you. have criterion related validity

Question 196

what is the concurrent method?

Answer 196

similar to predictive method but test scores and criterion measures are gathered at roughly the same time (used most often for criterion- related validity)