Research Final

Assume that you have developed a study technique that you believe will result in students scoring higher on research methods exams. You test your study technique with the design diagrammed below.R = random assignment0 = observationX = stimulusR 01 X 02R 03 04Using the diagrammed design, what predictions will you make?

02 should be greater than 01 and 04

In general, survey research is an appropriate observational method for

All of these

Target problems can be quantified in terms of their

All of these

Which of the following can be a purpose of program evaluation?

All of these

Which of the following designs can be used in program evaluation?

All of these

Which of the following statements is/are true about carrying out experiments and quasi-experiments in social agencies

All of these

You want to examine the relationship between family size and family cohesion. You use as your sample all the students in this research methods class. What kind of sampling design are you using?

Available sampling

In contrast to interviews, self-administered questionnaires have the advantage of

Being more effective in dealing with complicated issues.

Professionals who are conducting survey interviews in very poor neighborhoods should:

Do all of these.

The unit about which information is collected and which provides the basis of analysis is called the

Element

A major advantage of the key informants and community forum approaches to needs assessment is the representativeness of the opinions expressed.

False

Attrition effects are automatically controlled when participants are assigned randomly to experimental and control groups.

False

By definition, the self-administered questionnaire is synonymous with the mail survey.

False

Case-control designs have more controls for threats to validity than do most other designs for evaluating programs or practice.

False

External evaluators are always objective and independent of stakeholder influences in the way they design, carry out, and report their evaluations.

False

For any survey to have any value, the response rate must be at least 50 percent.

False

If a rigorous experimental assessment of program outcome finds that a program is not effective in attaining its goals, then there is no need to evaluate the program's implementation.

False

If the target problem improves at any point during the intervention phase, it is safe to infer that the intervention is effective.

False

In a single-case design with a student at high risk for dropping out of school, a good measurement plan to assess whether our intervention is effective would be to monitor whether or not he/she drops out of school.

False

In single-case experiments, direct observation is always better than using self-report scales or available records

False

It is safe to assume that agency staff members who initially approve of an experiment will remain in close compliance with its research protocol throughout the study.

False

Quantitative studies and qualitative studies are equally likely to employ probability sampling procedures.

False

Random assignment to experimental and control groups controls for research reactivity.

False

Selecting a sample that the researcher believes will yield the most comprehensive understanding of a subject based on an intuitive "feel" for the subject is employing quota sampling.

False

Self-monitoring is an example of unobtrusive observation.

False

The best time to send an e-mail message inviting people to respond to an online survey is late at night.

False

The classic experiment with random assignment of participants controls for measurement bias.

False

The one-group pretest-posttest design controls for passage of time.

False

The spread of telephone answering machines has improved the quality of data collected by telephone surveys.

False

The terms population and sampling frame are synonymous.

False

Whenever the interview contains open-ended questions, it is important that the interviewer summarize and paraphrase what has been said so that a more meaningful interpretation can be given to the data.

False

Which of the following statements is/are true about mailed surveys?

Follow-up mailings are essential

Suppose you obtained the following results in an ABAB design assessing the effectiveness of family therapy in reducing a childâ s temper tantrums. Which interpretation(s) is(are) plausible?Number of tantrums per day:A: 4 5 4 5 4 4B: 1 1 1 0 0 0A2: 0 0 0 0 0 0B2: 0 0 0 0 0 0

History could have caused the change or the intervention may have been effective, but with irreversible effects.

Which of the following statements is NOT true about the utilization of program evaluation results?

If the results are clear and have obvious policy implications, they will always be used.

Which of the following is NOT a characteristic of a cross-sectional study?

It concentrates on the changes that take place within a specific sample over a period of time.

Which of the following statements is NOT true about program evaluation?

It differs dramatically from most of the research done by social workers.

Which of the following is NOT true about follow-up mailings in mailed surveys in which the respondents are not identified on the questionnaire?

It is impossible to re-mail only to nonrespondents.

Which of the following is NOT a disadvantage of the community survey or target group survey approach to needs assessment?

It is one of the least direct ways to assess needs.

Which of the following statements is true about availability sampling in quantitative studies?

It is very risky but can yield useful results in some instances.

Which of the following is a disadvantage of community forum approach to a needs assessment?

Lack of repesentativeness

What would you infer from the following graph of the number of temper tantrums in an AB design?Baseline: 15 15 14 14 13 13 12 12 11 11Intervention: 10 10 9 9 8 8 7 7 6

Maturation appears to be the most plausible explanation

You want to draw a representative sample of social workers employed in domestic violence programs. You have a list of all such programs, but not of their staff members. Your survey will involve face-to-face interviews, and your travel budget is limited to visiting 10 cities. What kind of sampling design would you use?

Multistage cluster sampling

Which of the following is an example of unobtrusive observation?

None of these

When conducting an online survey, you should:

Present the password and link to the survey website early in the e-mail message.

Suppose an ABCD design obtains the following results regarding level of social adjustment with a chronically mentally ill client discharged to live with his family.A (Baseline): 10 10 10 10 10B (Social skills training): 10 10 10 10 10C (Occupational Rehabilitation): 10 10 10 10 10D (Family education): 15 20 25 30 35What is the most appropriate inference for future interventions with similar clients?

Replicate the study to assess possible order effects.

When follow-ups are planned with mail surveys,

Response rates typically increase

Which of the following statements is true about case-control designs?

Retrospective data are collected about past differences that might explain differences in outcome.

You are doing research on hospital personnel orderlies, technicians, nurses, and doctors. You want to be sure you draw a sample that has cases in each of the personnel categories. You want to use probability sampling. An appropriate strategy would be

Stratified sampling

The problem of an interaction between the testing and the experimental stimulus is handled by

The Solomon four-group design

A type of sampling which new cases are selected that seem to be similar to those that generated previously detected concepts and hypotheses but once the researcher perceives no new insights are being generated from observing similar cases, a different type of case is selected and the same process is repeated until the observation of different types of cases seems to be generating no new insights is called what?

Theoretical Sampling

Interview surveys have a number of advantages over mail surveys. Which of the following is NOT one of those advantages?

There are a smaller number of relevant responses given.

Which of the following statements is/are true about qualitative sampling methods?

They might involve purposively selecting deviant cases.

A demonstrated lack of response bias is more important than a high response rate.

True

Although AB designs offer the least control for history, they are often worth doing.

True

Because the rates under treatment approach to needs assessment looks only at those currently utilizing services, it is vulnerable to underestimating the true extent of need.

True

Cluster sampling is a useful sampling procedure for large populations that are geographically scattered.

True

Ideally, baselines should be extended until a stable trend in the data is evident.

True

In qualitative inquiry, purposive sampling can be used to select deviant cases as well as representative cases.

True

Multiple measurement points during baseline control for statistical regression.

True

Qualitative methods offer a number of techniques that on-site research staff members can use in attempting to observe research implementation pitfalls.

True

Quasi-experiments using nonequivalent comparison groups without random assignment can be credible, assuming that the comparability of the experimental and comparison groups is plausible-especially if the researcher provides substantial evidence of that comparability.

True

Sampling error can be reduced through an increase in the sample size of probability samples.

True

Snowball sampling is used when the members of a population are difficult to locate.

True

Sometimes it is appropriate to conduct single-case experiments with unstable baselines.

True

The ability to construct a retrospective baseline is one of the advantages of using available records.

True

The effectiveness of randomization in experimentation is affected by the number of participants involved.

True

The online survey website tool should enable respondents to take a break and then reenter the survey if they need to.

True

The problem of external validity refers to the generalizability of results.

True

Time series designs with many measurement points control for maturation.

True

Time series designs with many measurement points control for statistical regression.

True

Without using appropriate experimental and control groups, extraneous events in subjects' lives can make history a threat to internal validity, even if those events are of no historical importance to people in general.

True

Suppose a new social casework program is offered to students with high levels of truancy. If those students placed in the program by their families have significantly less truancy after participating than the students who did not participate in the program, then we can conclude that

a selection bias might explain away the difference.

Quasi-experimental designs are often used instead of experimental designs because

agency constraints often make experiments infeasible.

A school social worker administered a self-esteem test to a group of 9th graders in September. During the school year the students received intensive social work intervention designed to improve their self-esteem. In May the self-esteem test was given again and the self-esteem scores improved. A major problem in this research is that the researcher failed to control for

all of these

For a causal relationship to exist there must be evidence

all of these

In deciding what to measure in a single-case experiment, it is usually best to

all of these

In single-case experiments, maximizing the number of measurement points helps by

all of these

The length of the baseline in single-case designs should be

all of these

Which of the following procedures for dealing with an unstable baseline might be appropriate in some situations?

all of these

Drawing a purposive judgmental sample

allows researchers to use their prior knowledge about the topic.

Suppose a case management program is established to reduce rehospitalization rates in a hospital and that those rates drop dramatically once the new program is established. We can conclude that

another event occurring during the time of the study might explain away the change.

Pre-experimental designs

are the weakest experimental designs

When asking questionnaire items, the interviewer should

ask every question even if the respondent has apparently answered it already.

The Solomon four-group design

combines the classical experimental design with the posttest-only control group design.

The primary function of the probe is to

get the respondent to answer a question more fully.

In general, strengths of survey research include

making large samples feasible.

The classic experiment with random assignment of participants controls for:

none of these

The design diagrammed below: Assume that you have developed a study technique that you believe will result in students scoring higher on research methods exams. You test your study technique with the design diagrammed below.R = random assignment0 = observationX = stimulusR 01 X 02R 03 04

none of these

Suppose you instruct a couple to have a typical conversation while you observe them in your office. This would be an example of

obtrusive observation

Which of the following is LEAST suited to providing clear evidence about a causal relationship between the independent and dependent variables?

one-shot case study

Recommendations to maximize compliance with the case assignment protocol in experiments or quasi-experiments include

pilot testing the randomization procedure in the agency.

Suppose our research methods cause the client to improve. This would be termed

reactivity

When selecting a comparison group in a quasi-experimental design, one should

select a group as similar as possible to the experimental group.

If a qualitative researcher wanted to learn a community organization's pattern of recruitment over time, the researcher might begin by interviewing a fairly recent recruit and asking who introduced that person to the organization. Then the researcher might interview the person named and ask who introduced that person to the community organization. This would be an example of

snowball sampling

A friend of yours, a senior, took the Graduate Record Exam in September and scored in the 99th percentile. In February your friend took the same exam over again. This time your friend scored in the 84th percentile. As a research methodology student, you told your friend that his/her lowered score was probably due to

statistical regression

Every kth element in a list is chosen for inclusion in the sample in

systematic sampling

An instrumentation effect occurs when

the measurement instrument is changed from the pretest to the posttest.

The 55-mph speed limit was introduced in the U.S. in 1973. Shortly thereafter the number of auto accidents declined. We can conclude that

the reduced speed limit may have caused the decline in the number of auto accidents

Which of the following is (are) an advantage of the social indicators approach to needs assessment?

unobtrusiveness and inexpensiveness

If we can establish that variable X comes before variable Q in time, then we can say

variable Q is not a cause of variable X.