Law Criminology

Methods of Conducting the Survey

Introduction

On this paper we will discuss the appropriate method of conducting a survey for the study of attitudes towards punishing sex offenders. There are several methods for conducting a survey in criminal justice research. The formulation of hypothesis is most of the time influence while carrying out the research by the nature of research.

Discussion

Criminal justice or research of criminology is most of the time carried out with the aim of providing scientific factors to main decision making authorities of the field who might execute their plans of handling crime based on these studies. The Survey can be conducted in following way:

Web Based Questionnaire

The questionnaire based on Web is a brief tool as compared to community questionnaire with respect to number of questions. It allows the participants to provide unlimited details in practical. With these tools, we can yield a great deal of qualitative data from the respondents of the questionnaire, as they take the opportunity to provide their responses in length. The main objective of web based questionnaire is the fact that it allows the participant the opportunity to provide their responses with their own framework of comprehension to the questions regarding the monitoring and support post release and the reintegration of the sex offenders (http://www.socialresearchmethods.net).

With the web-base questionnaire, respondent will not have direct contact with the person conducting the research and this will reduce the probability that participants will provide their responses in socially acceptable way.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Questionnaire survey

Disadvantages

Similar to several methods of survey, questionnaire are evaluated after the occurrence of event therefore, respondents may forget the significant issues of the event. Moreover, questionnaires are restricted therefore, it is impossible for the description of any point in the questions that respondents may misunderstand (http://www.socialresearchmethods.net).

Open ended question may result in large amount of data that may take a longer time to evaluate and analyze. In addition, respondents may provide superficial responses to the questions if the questionnaire requires a lot of time to complete. In addition, respondents may not feel like providing their responses or they may feel like that their responses will lead them to punishment (http://www.socialresearchmethods.net).

Advantages

Questionnaire provides standardize responses therefore, they are considered as more objective means of survey specifically when compared to interview techniques. Usually, it is comparatively fast in collection of information. On the other hand, in some circumstances they may take loner time to ...