SOC 3323 Ch. 5

Which of the following is a(n) sign of the presence or absence of the concept that one is studying.?

Indicator

Which of the following is a nominal variable?

One needs to know the attributes to determine the level of measurement

Please conceptualize child abuse (or another abstract concept of your choice). What indicators would you use to measure the concept? Are there dimensions to the concept?

One possible answer is that child abuse refers to the mistreatment of a minor by his/her parent or guardian. Dimensions of child abuse might include physical abuse, emotional abuse, and psychological abuse. Indicators might include: 1) Have you ever been slapped by a parent? (Yes, No), 2) Have you ever been beaten up by a parent with a whip or belt? (Yes, No), 3) Have you ever been told that you were stupid by your mother/father? (Yes, No), and so on.

Shipley developed a NEW test to measure IQ. Using his test, someone with an IQ of 180 would be considered twice as intelligent as someone with an IQ of 90 and someone with an IQ of 90 was three times as intelligent as someone with an IQ of 30. Shipley's test treats IQ as a(n):

Ratio Variable

How would you measure family size at the nominal, ordinal, and ratio levels?

Ratio level: How many people (excluding yourself) are in your immediate (nuclear, family of orientation)? (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, .......) Ordinal level: Use the same question with attributes of (less than 3) (3 - 6) (more than 6) or small, medium, and large. Nominal level: Are there other people (besides you) in your immediate family? (Yes, No) or Do you have any brothers? (Yes, No) NOTE: Students sometimes claim the ordinal classification of (0-3) (3-5) (6 or more) is ratio because they "see" the 0 in the first category (0-3).De

Measuring how people feel about proposed income tax hikes when you really want to know how well informed they are on the proposal is a problem of operationalization concerning:

the specific dimensions of the variable to be studied.

Professor Myth asked respondents whether or not they had ever been divorced. One year later Professor Myth asked the same respondents the same question. Myth found that with repeated applications of the measure different responses were obtained for the same respondent. This means that the measuring instrument was:

unreliable or the value on the variable had changed.

A measurement of personality that produces observable, correct results, but that are not consistent would be considered:

valid, but not reliable.

Most social scientists would not accept the conceptualization of prejudice as foot size because such a measurement lacks:

validity.

A complete conceptualization involves:

specifying indicators and identifying the various dimensions of each indicator.

Even if a pre-existing measure of a construct of interest exists, it is a better idea to create your own so you understand it better.

False

If a measure is reliable, it must also be valid.

False

Precision and accuracy are synonyms.

False

53. The test-retest method assumes that the phenomena under study does not change.

a. True

29. When we fall into the trap of believing that terms have real meanings we are guilty of:

a. reification.

Which of the following sequences illustrates the progression of measurement steps in a fully structured scientific study?

Conceptualization, nominal definition, operational definition, and measurements in the real world

Dr. Ross is looking to examine if the indicators that make up her measurement of romantic attraction are truly related to one another and make for an accurate representation of the variable she is researching. What sort of validity is she examining?

Construct validity

Conceptualization is the development of research procedures that will result in empirical observations representing those concepts in the real world

False

As an extension of the previous question ask the students to evaluate their measurement in terms of validity. What do they think might be some potential shortcomings, or how does their measurement meet the requirements for validity?

Student answers will vary, but the answer should focus on issues of face validity, construct validity, content validity, as well as possible items of use to establish criterion-related validity.

Validity refers to the extent to which an empirical measure adequately reflects the real meaning of the concept under consideration.

True

Reliability is:

a matter of whether a particular technique, applied repeatedly to the same object, would yield the same results each time

Professor Spence decided to define socioeconomic status as a combination of income and education. Spence then determined the questions to be asked in a survey and the categories of responses. Spence was assigning socioeconomic status:

a nominal and an operational definition.

Dr. Jones is developing a research study in which he plans to use the length of a participant's ring finger to determine mathematical prowess. At the most basic level, his indicator fails which test for validity?

a. Face validity

42. Predictive validity is often used as another term for criterion-related validity.

a. True

44. Changing definitions almost inevitably results in different descriptive conclusions.

a. True

48. Definitions are more problematic for descriptive research than for explanatory research.

a. True

49. The split-half technique for assessing reliability is closely linked to concept of the interchangeability of indicators

a. True

41. A split-half reliability test taps the idea of the general stability of the instrument over time.

b. False

43. It is impossible to have several indicators of only one concept.

b. False

45. Precise measurement is more important than accurate measurement.

b. False

46. Number of arrests would be an example of an interval measurement

b. False

47. A nominal measure can have only two categories.

b. False

50. If unsure as a researcher how specific a measurement needs to be, it is best to be more general to simplify data

b. False

51. Numbers assigned to ranks on an ordinal scale can legitimately be added, multiplied, subtracted, and divided.

b. False

52. One only need a nominal definition of a concept before beginning the process of data collection

b. False

28. What is the lowest level of measurement in which there is an exact difference between attribute values?

b. Interval

Jeremy can't decide whether he should ask people whether they "very strongly agree," "agree," "disagree," "very strongly disagree" or whether they simply "agree" or "disagree" with statements about the war in Iraq. Jeremy is dealing with the problem of:

b. the range of variation.

Which of the following is NOT a means of assessing the reliability of measuring devices?

c. Construct-correlation

31. Verifying the validity of a measurement using an outside source of information, such as SAT scores or GPA when examining a measure of academic performance is using:

c. criterion-related validity.

Professor Salton created the categories of less than 20 hours, 20 hours to 40 hours, 40 hours to 60 hours, and 60 hours or more for the variable "number of hours employed outside the home." The attributes in Salton's scheme represents:

c. exhaustive measure.

34. A researcher entering gender data collected from a mailed survey is working with:

c. indirect observables.

27. The variable "educational level" of students was measured as last year in the school was completed (i.e., by using attributes such as none, 1st, 2nd, 3rd, grades, etc.) This type of measurement falls under _____ measures.

c. ratio

Sarah has compiled a list of 40 indicators of prejudice and its dimensions. She finds that women are more prejudiced than men on some of the indicators but not on others. Sarah should:

check to see if the two sets of indicators represent different dimensions of prejudice.

Professor Tyler wrote a proposal to study the impact of authoritarianism on child rearing practices. She began her research by reviewing the meaning of authoritarianism. Based on this review, she formulated her own definition of authoritarianism. This process illustrates:

conceptualization.

Professor Miller argues that there are three dimensions to the quality of a relationship (belonging/affirmation, interdependence, and intimacy). Miller designed an instrument to measure quality of a relationship. She notices that no items in the instrument tap the intimacy dimension. Her measure lacks:

content validity.

Considering the fact that low marital satisfaction should lead to divorce, Professor Rogers checked his measure of marital satisfaction by examining whether couples with low marital satisfaction scores got divorced and those with high levels of marital satisfaction were still married? This illustrates the use of:

criterion-related validity.

Hudson et al. developed a series of questions to examine sexual attitudes (SAS). The SAS scores of religious fundamentalists—a group believed to be conservative regarding sexual expression—were compared with the scores of social work graduate students—a group believed to be liberal regarding sexual expression. The researchers were examining the instrument's:

criterion-related validity.

25. Classifying someone as employed or not employed treats employment as:

d. a nominal variable.

26. Professor Tilton measured the variable "feelings toward drafting women" with the categories strongly agree, agree, indifferent, disagree, and strongly disagree. Professor Tilton was using the _____ level of measurement.

d. ordinal

A level of measurement describing a variable whose attributes are rank-ordered and have equal distances between adjacent attributes are _____ measures.

interval

A nominal definition:

is a statement that assigns a definition to a concept.

Conceptions are:

mental images.

A survey question asking voters which political party they are affiliated with (Democrat, Republican, Independent) would be considered:

mutually exclusive.

The specification of concepts in scientific inquiry depends on:

nominal and operational definitions.

A measure of religiosity that is extremely consistent, but is actually targeting the respondent's political affiliation could be considered:

not valid, but reliable.

Professor Smith gave an exam on Monday. On Wednesday Smith gave the same class the same exam. Professor Smith was clearly interested in assessing the exam's:

reliability