Survey assignment
Part 1
This assignment involves the hypothesis or hypotheses that you've been developing on Moodle. If there are revisions to make based on the comments I've given you, go ahead and do those before you proceed. Write a brief description of your research topic and propose your hypotheses. If they don't include one already, let at least one of the concepts in your hypotheses be an attitude, perception, or behavior that an individual might have. (Often this is the dependent variable in survey research.)
After this, list all the variables in your hypotheses. You should have at least three variables: independent, dependent, and control variables (corresponding to tests for spurious relationships, multivariate models, intervening variables, etc.).
Next, write survey questions and closed-ended responses for all your variables. Write at least three questions for the variable that's an attitude, perception, knowledge, or behavior. This means you should have a total of at least five survey questions. The goal here is that these questions, when answered, should generate data to test your hypotheses.
Print out your work (write your name at the top) and bring it to class on Tuesday, February 24.
Part 2
Exchange your Part 1 with another student and evaluate their questions and responses with these issues in mind:
| Validity: Are these questions and responses the best indicators for the variables proposed in the original hypotheses? |
| Reliability: Are these questions and responses clear and unambiguous enough that they would elicit the same response by different people with the same characteristics? |
| Operationalization: Are the closed-ended responses mutually exclusive and exhaustive? If there's an order to the underlying variable, do the responses clearly indicate that? |
| Word choice: Could these questions raise problems associated sensitive topics? Do they use of jargon or other unintelligible vocabulary? |
Write your evaluations on a new document. If you detect problems with the original questions or responses, rewrite them on this new document.
Next, analyze how the variables are constructed. Based on the original hypothesis in Part 1, what kind is each variable currently: nominal, ordinal, interval, ratio? What kind should each variable be after they're transformed into survey questions: nominal, ordinal, interval, ratio? (Remember, variables need not be the same kind after they're operationalized into survey questions.)
Staple the other student's Part 1 behind your Part 2 answers and turn them both in at the beginning of class on Thursday, February 26. Each student will be graded for their evaluation of the other student's survey instrument.
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