Questionnaires and Interviews



Questionnaires and Interviews

Non-experimental technique

Similarly to correlations and observations questionnaires and interviews are non-experimental, meaning that there is no IV and DV. Both questionnaires and interviews are types of self report method. This is because the participant reports their own thoughts and feelings about a particular matter. A questionnaire is where the responses are written down by the participant, and an interview is where the participant gives a verbal response which is then recorded by the interviewer.

Method or technique?

Just like observations, interviews and questionnaires can either be used as a technique as part of another type of research study (such as a lab study) or it can be used by itself as a research method. When they are used as a technique, it may be something that the researcher does at the end of an experiment in order to gain information about the participants’ experience in the study. Have any of the core studies we have looked at so

far used interviews and questionnaires in this way? ___________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________________________

We are going to focus on the use of interviews and questionnaires as a research method. The next two core studies (Bennett-Levy & Marteau and Buss) use interviews and questionnaires as a research method.

Questionnaires (pg 158)

A questionnaire is a set of questions. It is designed to collect information about a topic or topics. There are two great strengths of using questionnaires:

✓ You can collect the same information from a large number of people relatively easily.

✓ You can access what people think - observations and experiments rely on “guessing” what people think based on their behaviour. With a questionnaire you can ask people directly.

There are different types of question that can be asked in a questionnaire. Using the information on page 155, match the following boxes

|Type | |Description | |Data |

|Open Question | |The participant can give any answer they wish | |Quantitative |

|Closed Question | |The participant makes a mark on a line to express the | |Quantitative |

| | |level of agreement with a particular view | | |

|Semantic differentials | |There are a number of responses to a question which often | |Qualitative |

| | |demonstrate a degree of agreement | | |

|Likert scales | |There are a set number of responses which the participant | |Quantitative |

| | |selects from | | |

On the following page is an example of a questionnaire about eating habits. Have a go at answering the questions. Identify whether the questions are open, closed, likert or semantic differential.

|Questionnaire |Type of question |

|1. Do you have breakfast before going to school? | |

|Yes | |

|No | |

| | |

|2. What do you normally have for breakfast? | |

|_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________| |

|_________________________________ | |

| | |

|3. Do you usually have a snack in the morning/ in the afternoon? | |

|Yes | |

|No | |

| | |

|4. How much do you agree with the statement “I often eat salad or vegetables with lunch or dinner”? | |

|Strongly agree Agree Don’t know Disagree Strongly disagree | |

| | |

|5. How many times a week do you eat fish? | |

|Everyday | |

|2 or 3 times a week | |

|Rarely | |

|Never | |

| | |

|6. What is your opinion of your own eating habits? | |

| | |

|I am very healthy ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I am very | |

|unhealthy | |

What potential issues did you have when filling out the questionnaire? Do you think it was a good questionnaire, or did it have any faults?

Evaluation of Questionnaires

Using the information on page 158-160, cross out the wrong underlined word to create an evaluation point. Circle the tick or the cross to state whether it is a strength or a weakness

| | |Closed questions produce qualitative/quantitative data which is easier to analyse |

| | |In closed questions, respondents may be forced to select answers which represent/do not represent their real thoughts and feelings, leading |

| | |to data which has lower/higher validity |

| | |Open questions produce qualitative/quantitative data which can/does not provide unexpected answers and rich detail allowing/preventing |

| | |researchers to gain new insights. |

| | |Open questions can be harder/easier to analyse due to the small/large number of possible answers. This can make it difficult/easy to draw |

| | |conclusions. |

| | |Questionnaires are difficult/easy to repeat, meaning that data can be collected from a small/large number of people. |

| | |An advantage/disadvantage of questionnaires over interviews is that respondents may feel more/less able to reveal personal information in a |

| | |questionnaire than face to face. |

| | |The social desirability bias means that respondents may deliberately answer in a way which is socially acceptable/unacceptable. |

| | |If a questionnaire is structured poorly, there may be leading questions/ participant effects causing respondents to answer in a particular |

| | |way |

| | |Because only certain types of people fill in and return questionnaires, there may be a sample bias/demand characteristics |

| | |Questionnaires are a flexible/inflexible method of collecting data, meaning that the researcher is able/unable to tailor it to their needs. |

| | |Questionnaires rely on a respondent’s ability to report accurately. An individual may not/may have sufficient insight into their own |

| | |behaviour to be able to record it accurately. |

| | |One of the biggest strengths/weaknesses of questionnaires is that different questions may be interpreted differently by different |

| | |participants. |

| | |A poorly constructed questionnaire might produce meaningless/meaningful data if the questions are too vague. Participants may provide random|

| | |answers rather than leave it blank. |

Interviews (pg 159)

Which of the approaches from PY1 used interviews? Can you name a study? ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

An interview is similar to a questionnaire, except that the questions are asked face to face (or over the phone) rather than on paper.

What is a structured interview? __________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________________________

What is an unstructured interview? ________________________________________________________________ ______________________________________________________________________________________________

A semi structured interview combines both structured and unstructured interviews. The interviewer might have a series of prepared questions, but will alter the interview as it goes along, adding new questions as information arises. It s rather like the interview you have when you go see a doctor, and as such, is often called a clinical interview.

|Decide whether the following strengths and weaknesses apply to structured interviews, unstructured interviews |Structured, unstructured, both |

|or both. | |

| | |More detailed information can be obtained from each respondent | |

| | |Requires less interviewing skill, therefore can be done by non-professional interviewers | |

| | |Easier to analyse as the answers are more predictable | |

| | |Can easily be repeated because the questions are standardised | |

| | |In depth qualitative data can be collected | |

| | |Quantitative data can also be collected | |

| | |Information can be accessed that might not be revealed by using predetermined questions. | |

| | |Interviewer bias may be a particular issue as the interviewer is making up questions on the spot| |

| | |The interviewer’s own opinions may influence the interviewee. This is called interviewer bias | |

| | |Reliability may be affected by the same interviewer behaving differently on different occasions | |

| | |Reliability may be affected by different interviewers asking different questions, or asking the | |

| | |same questions in different ways. | |

| | |More difficult to analyse the data as there will be lots more of it, and each respondent may | |

| | |have been asked different questions | |

| | |Different questions may be interpreted in different ways by different participants | |

| | |The answers the participants give may be restricted by the questions that are asked | |

What ethical issues can be raised by the use of questionnaires and interviews?

Exam Practice

1: A researcher used a questionnaire to investigate whether there is a relationship between type of occupation and preference for sporting activities. The researcher put up a poster in a local all-male gym asking for volunteers. The participants were then given a questionnaire which assessed the following:

a) What type of job they had (either a “manual job”, a “desk job”, or “other”).

b) What type of sports they enjoyed playing the most (either “Football”, “Rugby” or “Athletics”).

The results are in the table below:

| |Favourite Sport |

|Type of job |Football |Rugby |Athletics |

|Manual |57% |32% |11% |

|Desk |15% |69% |16% |

|Other |32% |39% |29% |

The following are exam style questions.

(a) Identify one advantage and one disadvantage of using a questionnaire in this study. [3]

(b) Identify one issue of reliability in this research, and describe how you could deal with it. [3]

(c) Identify one issue of validity in this research, and describe how you could deal with it. [3]

(d) Identify one advantage and one disadvantage of using volunteer sampling in this research [3]

(e) Discuss one ethical issue that may arise in this research. [3]

(f) State one conclusion which can be drawn from the results in this research [3]

-----------------------

Deception:

Psychological harm:

Privacy:

Confidentiality:

Dealing with validity in interviews and questionnaires (use the handout on Validity and Reliability)

VALIDITY

• The external validity of questionnaires and interviews concerns the way in which the findings can be generalised to other situations and people. The main issue is with the representativeness of the sample used. If the sample only uses female shoppers in a supermarket on a Monday morning, we may not be able to generalise the results to all people.

o How could we deal with this issue? ____________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________________

o What sampling method could be used to make sure that the sample was representative?

_________________________________________________________________________________

• The internal validity of self report techniques is the issue of whether the questionnaire/interview is actually measuring what it intends to measure. If the questionnaire/interview is not properly constructed, your results may be meaningless.

o How can we assess construct validity? _________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

o How can we assess concurrent validity? ________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

• Leading questions may cause the participants to answer in a way which is not reflective of their real point of view. In an unstructured interview, the person asking the questions may deliberately or accidently lead the participant to give the response that they want.

o Leading questions can be identified and eradicated by using a pilot study, where the questionnaire is tried out on a small group of people to highlight any potential problems.

o A double blind technique could be used, where the person asking the questions does not know the aim of the study, therefore minimising leading questions.

• Also, there may be a strong social desirability bias where the participant selects an answer which portrays them in a good light rather than those which reflect the truth

o The level of social desirability can be assessed using a lie scale. A number of questions are added to the questionnaire as “truth-detectors”. A person who is telling the truth should give a predictable answer. For example, the truthful answer to “Are you always happy?” is “no” (even the happiest person is not happy all the time!). A person who wants to portray themselves in a good light may answer “yes” to this question. People who lie on a high proportion of these questions may also be lying in other answers.

RELIABILITY

• The internal reliability refers to how consistent a test is within itself. For example, all of the questions on an IQ test should be measuring the same thing (intelligence). This issue will not be relevant for all questionnaires or interviews, as some may be measuring more than one thing

o How could we assess internal reliability using the split half method? _________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

• External reliability is a measure of consistency over several different occasions. For example, if a researcher gave a questionnaire, and then gave the same questionnaire to the same person a week later, the outcome should be the same.

o How could we assess external reliability using the test-retest method? _______________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

• In interviews, reliability also refers to whether two interviewers produce the same outcomes. As the interpretation of what people say in an interview is often reliant on subjective interpretation, two interviewers could interpret the data in different ways.

o Inter-interviewer reliability can be established by comparing the results of two interviewers and seeing how similar they are. This is calculated by correlating the results of two or more interviewers. Generally, if there is more than 80% agreement between the interviewers, the data has inter-interviewer reliability.

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