Ch. 9 Quantitative and Qualitative Measurement Instruments

open-ended questions

These type of questions are more prevalent in qualitative research

questionnaire

a collection of questions is considered a?

qustionnaire

a document that contains questions and other types of items that are designed to solicit information appropriate for analysis is considered a?

contingency question

a question asked only of some respondents, depending on their response to some other question.

probe

a technique for soliciting in a non-directive and unbiased manner a more complete answer to a question

scales

allow us to represent complex variables with scores that provide greater potential for variance than would a single item.

contingency

an example of this kind of question is asking about the number of times a person has been pregnant should only be asked to woman

biased

an example of this kind of question would be assessing the attitudes of community residents about a half way house proposed for their neighborhood and asking residents if they agreed with prominent clergy in supporting the halfway house

close-ended questions

can be used in self-administered questionnaires, interview schedules, and are popular in quantitative research beacuse they provide a mass amount of data and are more easily processed.

qualitative interviews

can range from completely unstructured informal conversational interviews that use no measurment instruments to highly structured, standardized interviews in which interviewers must ask questions in the exact order and with the exact wording in which they are written in advance.

exhaustive

close-ended questions answer choices should be _______, meaning that they include all the possible responses expected. Researchers ensure this by adding "other" category

scales

include several indicators of a variable in one summary measure

standardized open-ended interview measurement

instrument consists of questions that are "written out in advance exactly the way they are to be asked in the interview"

unstructured qualitative interview

is a essentially a conversation in which the interviewer establishes a general direction for the conversation and pursues specific topics raised by the respondent. Ideally, the respondent does most of the talking.

interview guide

is a qualitative measurement instrument that lists in the outline form the topics and issues that the interviewer should cover in the interview, but it allows the interviewer to adapt the sequencing and wording of questions to each particular interview.

unstructured qualitative interview

is an interaction between an interviewer and a respondent in which the interviewer has a general plan of inquiry but not a specific set of questions that must be asked in particular words and in a particular order.

informal conversational interview

is an unplanned and unanticipated interaction between an interviewer and a respondent that occurs naturally during the course of observation.

informal conversational interview

is the most open-ended form of interviewing

likert scales

present respondents with statements followed by response choices for respondents to indicate whether they "strongly agree" "agree" "disagree" or are "undecided"

double-barreled question

questions to avoid as a researcher that involve asking questions with 'and'

biased

questions to be avoided by the researcher and that encourage respondents to answer in a particular way are said to be...?

standardized open-ended interview

researchers will want to ensure that all interviews are conducted in a consistent, thorough manner-with a minimum of interviewer effects and biases. When this is the aim the most appropriate strategy is to conduct a _______

the difference between quantitative and qualitative measures

the chief difference between quantitative and qualitative measures for asking people questions is that quantitative measures are always highly structured, tend to use close ended questions primarily, and may be administered in either an interview or questionnaire format, where as qualitative measures rely primarily on interviews that are usually unstructured and that mainly contain open-ended questions with in-depth probes.

scales

the cumulative measures of complex variables are called

close-ended questions

the respondent chooses their answer from a list of answer choices provided by the researcher

mutually exhaustive

the respondent should not feel compelled to select more than one answer

questionnaires

these provide s method of collecting data by (1) asking people questions, or (2) asking them to agree or disagree with statements that represent different points of view.

open-ended questions

this is where a respondent is asked to provide his or her answer to a quesion

qualitative open-ended interviewing

three forms include: 1. the informal conversational interview 2. the general interview guide approach, and 3. the standardized open-ended interview

semi-structured unterviews

used in qualitative studies that use interview guides that list in outline form the topics and issues the interview to be flexible, informal, and conversational and to adapt the style of the interview and the sequencing and wording of questions to each particular interviewee.

true

usually, short items in a questionnaire are better than long ones. T/F?