Lecture 5 - Ch. 6

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Lecture 5 - Ch. 6 Field Research
Naturalistic observation in natural setting
Archival research preexisting
records Surveys asking direct questions of
persons Case study single group or
person Program evaluation conducting
evaluations of applied procedures Field
experiments causal inferences
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Field Research
Generalizability extent to which results from
a study based on a sample apply to the
population as a whole - real world

nonrepresentative sample not accurately
reflecting the characteristics of the
population from which The sample was drawn
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observations
Unobtrusive no contact with subject
Participant observer Contact with the subject
Archival data
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• Hawthorne Effect
• (Roethlisberger Dickson, 1939)
• A bias in subjects behavior usually an
  improvement
• in performance - that results from special
  treatment and
• interest shown by the experimenter
• Hawthorne Electric
• Measure productivity
• Lumination of room
• Hours worked
• of rest periods

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Observational Research
Study the subject in their natural environment
Ethogram

• inventory of the behaviors of a species
• behaviors thoroughly described and organized into
  categories
• enables animal behaviorists to accurately measure
  behavior
• "behavior scan" method "scan" at regular, brief
  intervals
• results frequency of behavior (graph) or time
  budgets

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Archival Research

• - Historical accounts
• census data
• court records
• Police crime reports
• medical records

Have to have research question Purely descriptive
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Survey Research in the field
Survey one or several questions that ask people
about their attitudes, beliefs, health, work,
income life satisfaction, political views
etc.any issue can be surveyed
Mostly used in the social sciences (social
psych) .sounds easy..just whip up some
questions..
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Survey Research in the field

• Identify content area
• Construct your survey instrument
• Define population
• Draw representative sample
• Administer the survey

Administration of survey
mail
Interview
questionnaire
Group or single
In person or telly
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Survey Research in the field

• 2 parts to survey
• Demographics
• Content Questions

Construction of questions
1. Open ended 2. Multiple choice 3. Likert
scale (continuum)
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Likert Scale
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Likert Scale for Children
Do you think time-out is a good thing?
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Survey Research in the field

• Sampling procedures
• Non probability
• probability

• Convenience Sampling Getting the first subjects
  available Ex. Exiting polls
• Quota Convenience sample to represents subgroups
  proportionate to the real population
• Snowball locate each subject from previous
  contact with previous subject

1. Simple randomly select subjects from list of
population 2. Systematic select every nth name
form the list of population 3. Stratified
randomly select from subgroup, proportionate to
each groups representation in the population
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Survey Research in the field
Research Designs
Cross-sectional design (one shot deal) compares
responses of people of different ages at one
time survey is only administered one time to
each participant comparisons are made across
age groups to investigate age related changes in
behavior/attitudes etc.
Longitudinal design (long-term) participants are
studied over time on the same DV follow up
tests within subjects design - How does the
subject change over time