SOCIAL RESEARCH SKILLS

Social Research Skills

Social Research Skills

1.

a. The different levels that a quantitative variable uses to describe its properties are

Measures of central tendency: mean, median, mode.

Measures of dispersion: range, variance, standard deviation, coefficient of variation.

Measures of the distribution: skewness, kurtosis.

Graphic representations: histograms and box plots, for

b. Ordinal variables allow ranking (order) objects, indicating which of them to a greater or lesser extent have the quality expressed by the variable. However, they do not allow us to say "how much more" or "how much less." Ordinal variables are sometimes also referred to as ordinal. A typical example of an ordinal variable - family socioeconomic status (Cohen et al, 2002, 113). We understand that the upper-middle level above the average, however, say that the difference between them is, say, 18%, we cannot. The very location of the scales in the following order: nominal, ordinal, interval is a good example of an ordinal scale.

c. The different levels of measurement

Virtually all the works concerned with quantitative methods in psychology reserve a special place to the notion of different levels of measurement. According to this view, the measurement of a phenomenon can be done using four scales with properties very different: the nominal scale, ordinal scale, the scale of equal intervals and the wide proportions. Stevens has championed a strict position that the level of measurement used determines the type of statistical analysis it is possible to do on the data (Chernoff et al, 2004, 101).

The nominal scales are actually very poor in information and only allow analysis based on frequency, so it is best to avoid nominal values ??...

Ordinal scales, contrary to what one might think, are very rare in psychology. For example, questionnaires that use Likert-type scales generally yield total scores that are much richer than just lining up.

Most measures are considered psychological measures at regular intervals, although the demonstration of this property is not always obvious.

In practice, a continuous measure (which can take many values) is deemed to have equal intervals and therefore permits the use of parametric statistics.

The measures to scale proportions are very rare in the assessment of psychological phenomena. The condition of zero is not found in the fact that in the measurement of physical properties.

2.

Descriptive Statistics

N

Minimum

Maximum

Mean

Std. Deviation

Age of Respondent

1500

18

89

46.23

17.418

Valid N (listwise)

1500

The total number of the respondents is 1500.

The mean age of the sample is 46 years.

c.

Respondent's Sex

Frequency

Percent

Valid Percent

Cumulative Percent

Valid

Male

641

42.7

42.7

42.7

Female

859

57.3

57.3

100.0

Total

1500

100.0

100.0

The percentage of female respondents is 57.3 %

3.

a. The oldest respondent is 89 years old.

b.

Agecat

Frequency

Percent

Valid Percent

Cumulative Percent

Valid

18-24

128

8.5

8.5

8.5

25-34

304

20.3

20.3

28.8

35-44

368

24.5

24.5

53.3

45-54

243

16.2

16.2

69.5

55-64

167

11.1

11.1

80.7

65+

285

19.0

19.0

99.7

99

5

.3

.3

100.0

Total

1500

100.0

100.0

There are 20.5 % of the respondents of the age group 35-44.

4.

a.

Descriptive Statistics

N

Sum

Mean

Std. Deviation

Variance

Hours Per week reading books

1500

4324

2.90

2.238

5.009

Valid N (listwise)

1500

Statistics

Hours Per week reading books

N

Valid

1500

Missing

0

Median

2.00

Mode

2

Std. Deviation

8.500

Variance

72.246

The two measures of dispersion are standard variation and variance, which are 8.5 and 72.24 respectively. While the two measures of central tendency are median and mode, which are 2 for both the measures.

b.

One-Sample Statistics

N

Mean

Std. Deviation

Std. Error Mean

Hours Per week reading books

1500

3.60

8.500

.219

One-Sample Test

Test Value = 0

t

df

Sig. (2-tailed)

Mean Difference

95% Confidence Interval of the Difference

Lower

Upper

Hours Per week reading ...