Deck 4: Research Design

Question 1

By itself,the 2000 Census exemplifies a study that when compared to another decennial census could be considered a study.

A)cross-sectional; trend
B)cross-sectional; panel
C)cross-sectional; cohort
D)cross-sectional; cross-sectional
E)trend; cohort

Answer 1

A

Question 2

The topic of surrogate mothers interested Professor Snyder.Snyder read the available materials on the topic and wanted to develop an age,education,and income profile of women who serve as surrogate mothers in the United States.To develop this profile,Snyder should undertake a(n)

A)trend study.
B)descriptive study.
C)explanatory study.
D)panel study.
E)cohort study.

Answer 2

B

Question 3

Which of the following is NOT a characteristic of a cross-sectional study?

A)It is conducted at only one point in time.
B)It can be exploratory, descriptive, or explanatory.
C)It concentrates on the changes that take place among a specific sample over a period of time.
D)It provides a means for studying a large population at the same point in time.
E)All of these choices are characteristics of the cross-sectional study.

Answer 3

C

Question 4

A single U.S.Census exemplifies a

A)cross-sectional study.
B)panel study.
C)time series study.
D)trend study.
E)longitudinal study.

Question 5

If a researcher wanted to know why there was a noticeable increase in the number of burglaries in the town of Southpaw during 2005,the researcher should design a(n)

A)descriptive study.
B)explanatory study.
C)panel study.
D)study of characteristics.
E)exploratory study.

Question 6

Which of the following employs the nomothetic model of explanation?

A)An examination of all the considerations that resulted in 85% of the senior class members being hired for the jobs of their choice.
B)An attempt to understand all the reasons concerning why five former presidents of the United States ran for office.
C)An isolation of the three most important reasons as to why men were selected to all the leadership positions at a former women's college that went coed.
D)A list of all the reasons given by first-year students for selecting the college they currently attend.
E)All of these choices employ the nomothetic model of explanation.

Question 7

Professor King examined all the reasons given by 50 couples for their marriages.In the final research report,King listed all the reasons given by the 100 people for their marriages.Professor King is

A)seeking a probabilistic explanation for marriage.
B)using a nomothetic explanation for marriage.
C)using an idiographic explanation for marriage.
D)committing the error of suppressed evidence.
E)did not seek informed consent in his research.

Question 8

Professor Root was studying the arrest rates for drunken driving in urban and rural areas of Ohio.It was found that the arrest rate was higher in the rural areas.Professor Root concluded that people who live in rural areas are more likely to drive while intoxicated than are people who live in urban areas.Root's conclusion

A)illustrates the ecological fallacy.
B)illustrates the individualistic fallacy.
C)illustrates good deductive reasoning.
D)illustrates the importance of trend studies.
E)illustrates the role of ethics in social research

Question 9

Nakeia was studying the literature on homicide survivors and found that no studies had been conducted examining the special condition of children of terrorism victims.If she wanted to examine this topic she should perform what type of study?

A) descriptive study.
B) exploratory study.
C) explanatory study.
D) panel study.
E) reductionism study.

Question 10

If we can establish that variable X comes before variable Q in time,then we can say

A)variable X is a cause of variable Q.
B)variable X is not a cause of variable Q.
C)variable Q is a cause of variable X.
D)variable Q is not a cause of variable X.
E)variable Q may cause variable X.

Question 11

In Sweden,there is a very strong correlation between the number of storks and the number of babies born.However,both of these variables are associated with region (rural vs.urban).This illustrates

A)that the number of storks is causally related to the number of babies born.
B)that the number of babies born precedes the number of storks in time.
C)that there is no causal relationship between the number of storks and the number of babies.
D)that storks really do bring babies.
E)that the relationship between the numbers of storks and the numbers of babies is non-spurious.

Question 12

If a researcher was conducting a study of women's attitudes toward abortion,the unit of analysis would be

A)the woman.
B)attitudes.
C)each abortion.
D)the women's attitudes.
E)the society.

Question 13

A researcher examined newspaper editorials that focused on the Patriot's Act.She examined the editorials published in the major newspapers in major cities in the United States.The unit of analysis was

A)the Patriot Act.
B)the major cities.
C)the newspapers.
D)the newspaper editorials.
E)the United States.

Question 14

There is a strong correlation between the number of firefighters that show up at a fire and the amount of damage produced by the fire.The size of the fire influences both the number of firefighters and the amount of damage.This illustrates that the relationship between the number of firefighters and the amount of damage is

A)spurious.
B)causal.
C)not correlational.
D)a real relationship.
E)non-spurious.

Question 15

Descriptive studies DO NOT

A)study relationships between variables.
B)tell why something occurred.
C)use operational definitions.
D)use concepts.
E)examine a new phenomena.

Question 16

Which of the following statements is FALSE regarding necessary and sufficient causes?

A)A necessary cause represents a condition that, by and large, must be present for the effect to follow.
B)A sufficient cause represents a condition that, if it is present, will pretty much guarantee the effect in question.
C)In social science, we typically find a single necessary and sufficient cause to establish a causal relationship.
D)Idiographic analyses typically yield sufficient causes for a particular result.
E)A sufficient cause is not the only possible cause of a particular outcome.

Question 17

Which of the following statements is TRUE?

A)Being arrested is a necessary cause for having a criminal trial.
B)A child's birth is a sufficient cause for having a cigar.
C)A child's birth is a necessary cause for having a cigar.
D)Being arrested is a sufficient cause for having a criminal trial.
E)A child's birth is a necessary and sufficient cause for having a cigar.

Question 18

For a causal relationship to exist there must be evidence

A)of an empirical correlation between the variables.
B)that one variable precedes the other in time.
C)that a third variable did not cause the changes observed in the first two variables.
D)that one variable precedes the other in time and that the two variables are correlated.
E)that one variable precedes the other in time, that the two variables are correlated and that this relationship is not spurious.

Question 19

Explanatory studies are designed to find answers to which of the following questions?

A)What is the educational profile of people who change careers in midlife?
B)Why are people changing careers in midlife?
C)How many people change careers in midlife?
D)Does the occupational prestige of a career tend to increase for midlife career changers?
E)What careers do people enter midlife?

Question 20

Which of the following hypotheses best fits the criteria of causality?

A)Males have higher suicide rates than females.
B)As income increases, age tends to increase.
C)As education increases, income tends to increase.
D)As education increases, income tends to increase even after controlling for gender and race.
E)Gender tends to influence jury verdict.

Question 21

Yugorsky studied five fifth-grade classes over three years to determine how friendship patterns established in the fifth grade affected friendship patterns in the eighth grade.He studied the same group of students over time,but not necessarily the same individuals.Which design did he use?

A)panel
B)cohort
C)trend
D)cross-sectional
E)juvenile

Question 22

Committing the error of reductionism is most closely tied to the selection of a(n)

A)hypothesis.
B)longitudinal study.
C)descriptive study.
D)action focus.
E)theoretical paradigm.

Question 23

Cindy established that gender came before voting in her study of adults in her city,so the time order was clear.She also ruled out the effects of age,religiosity,and other "third" variables.Which criterion for causality remains for her to establish?

A)that no serious ethical violations have occurred
B)that no serious political violations have occurred
C)that the unit of analysis is appropriate
D)that the variables are correlated
E)that a causal relationship exists

Question 24

Which one of the following is the best example of reductionism?

A)Sam reduced his sample of church members from 500 to 200 so that it was more manageable.
B)Reba used only one theory in her study of cheating.
C)Steve used only cross-sectional research in his study of teen alcohol consumption.
D)Roberto explained suicide entirely in terms of psychological factors.
E)Greta reduced cooking time for making a stew from 1 hour to 45 minutes

Question 25

Professor Stone designs a study to examine the effect of a teenage pregnancy on young women's career choices.Stone wants to interview a sample of teenage women during their pregnancy,after the baby's birth,and once a year after that for a ten year period.Stone is using a

A)cross sectional design.
B)trend study.
C)cohort study.
D)panel study.
E)experimental study.

Question 26

The ecological fallacy is most relevant in terms of which one of the following?

A)criteria for establishing nomothetic causal explanations
B)purposes of research
C)necessary and sufficient causes
D)units of analysis
E)writing hypotheses

Question 27

Brunelle concluded from her study on gender and delinquency that it is not just probabilistic that men commit more delinquency,but that gender is the only relevant factor in that high levels of delinquency are always committed by men.Which false criterion for nomothetic causality is reflected in this example?

A)complete causation
B)exceptional cases
C)majority of cases
D)falsification of cases
E)minority of cases

Question 28

Exploratory studies are done for all EXCEPT which one of the following purposes?

A)to satisfy the researcher's curiosity and desire for better understanding
B)to sort out the ethical implications of a study
C)to test the feasibility of undertaking a more extensive study
D)to develop the methods to be used in any subsequent study
E)to clarify global definitions of words/phrases

Question 29

To look at changes in the average age of marriage for men and women in the United States,Professor Torme studied the U.S.Censuses over a period of decades.Torme was doing a(n)

A)panel study.
B)cross-sectional study.
C)cohort study.
D)trend study.
E)experimental study.

Question 30

Longitudinal studies are particularly useful for addressing which criterion for establishing causality?

A)time order
B)correlation
C)nonspuriousness
D)complete causation
E)eradicating results from chance

Question 31

A researcher focuses on the ________when faced with the question "From whom or what will the information be gathered?"

A)purposes of research
B)units of analysis
C)topics for research
D)time dimension
E)motivations for research

Question 32

Professor Willard was interested in examining whether countries with higher GNPs tend to have more gangs than countries with lower GNPs.Willard's unit of analysis was

A)gangs.
B)GNPs.
C)countries.
D)individuals.
E)police departments.

Question 33

Spurious relationships are relevant for which criterion for establishing nomothetic causality?

A)correlation
B)time order
C)the effect cannot be explained in terms of some third variable
D)exceptional cases
E)hypothesis

Question 34

Andrea studied Native American women to learn more about how they cope with their minority status.What was her unit of analysis?

A)individuals
B)groups
C)organizations
D)artifacts
E)subgroups

Question 35

Andrew studied family conflict as portrayed in the media by reading letters to advice columns.What was his unit of analysis?

A)individuals
B)groups
C)organizations
D)artifacts
E)media

Question 36

Tyler finds that in burglary cases men and women are equally likely to vote to acquit.Tyler should conclude that

A)there is no relationship between burglary and gender.
B)there is no relationship between burglary and verdicts.
C)there is a relationship between gender and verdict in burglary cases.
D)there is no relationship between gender and verdict in burglary cases.
E)there is a relationship between gender and type of offense.

Question 37

Desiree did a study on the causes of juvenile delinquency.Specifically,she examined if living in a city as opposed to the suburbs caused adolescents to become more delinquent.Which purpose of research did she pursue?

A)cross-sectional
B)longitudinal
C)exploration
D)explanation
E)evaluation

Question 38

In order to receive an honorable or dishonorable discharge from the military,you must be in the military.In terms of the discharge type,being in the military is a(n)

A)necessary cause.
B)sufficient cause.
C)exceptional cases cause.
D)majority of cases cause.
E)military cause

Question 39

Ricardo studied married couples in order to see if length of marriage affected the nature and quality of communication patterns.Which unit of analysis did he use?

A)individual
B)group
C)organization
D)social artifact
E)communication patterns

Question 40

Which of the following designs uncovers only net changes?

A)cohort and trend studies
B)trend and panel studies
C)cohort and panel studies
D)cohort and cross-sectional studies
E)trend and cross-sectional studies

Question 41

Which one of the following designs is the most likely to be used for descriptive purposes?

A)cross-sectional
B)trend
C)cohort
D)panel
E)group

Question 42

Senator Robertson wants to know how voter interest in issues in his district has changed over time.It would be best to use a

A)trend study.
B)cohort study.
C)panel study.
D)cross-sectional study.
E)group

Question 43

Research studies that follow the same people at different times,collecting data at specified intervals,are what kind of study?

A)cohort
B)cross-sectional
C)panel
D)trend
E)spurious

Question 44

A researcher selects a sample of citizens in a community and interviews them before a new factory is built in the community.The researcher interviews these same citizens six months later and one final time a year later.The researcher has engaged in ______ research design.

A)trend
B)cross-sectional
C)panel
D)age
E)period

Question 45

Paul is performing a research study in which he is looking at the presentation of gender in children's picture books.His unit of analysis is the book,so what is he studying?

A)individuals
B)groups
C)social interactions
D)organizations
E)social artifacts

Question 46

Once you have a well-defined purpose for your study and a clear description of the kinds of outcomes you want to achieve,the next step in your research design is

A)population and sampling.
B)choice of research method.
C)conceptualization.
D)operationalization.
E)conducting a literature review

Question 47

This type of research design examines a phenomena at a single point in time

A)panel
B)trend
C)spurious
D)cross-sectional
E)cohort

Question 48

Attrition of study participants is most critical for which of the following designs?

A)cross-sectional
B)trend
C)cohort
D)panel
E)group

Question 49

Which one of the following is the BEST example of the ecological fallacy?

A)Catherina studied the ecology of social interaction in her dorm, but focused only on individuals.
B)Felisha studied Census tracts for her study on crime, but then wrote up her conclusions in terms of individuals.
C)Sean did not actually study the same individuals in his longitudinal study of worker alienation, but called his study a panel study.
D)Jack mistakenly called his unit of analysis organizations, but it was really social artifacts in his study of humor.
E)Mary applied the reasons for why her cousin, Jane, failed her driving test to all persons who failed their driving tests.

Question 50

The positive relationship between shoe size and IQ is what kind of relationship?

A)causal
B)negative
C)spurious
D)nonspurious
E)qualitative

Question 51

Which of the following statements is NOT correct?

A)In order for variable A to cause variable B, variable A must occur before variable.
B)If variable A causes variable B, then variable A and variable B will usually be correlated with one another.
C)It is possible for a dependent variable to have more than one cause.
D)If there is a correlation between two variables, then one of those variables must be having an effect of some sort on the other.
E)A suppressor variable causes two variables to appear to be uncorrelated with one another when they actually are correlated.

Question 52

Operationalization is:

A)the part of the theory that tells us how variables are related.
B)the procedures which we go through to identify and measure variables.
C)the procedures we go through before we can develop a hypothesis.
D)the part of a theory that tells us what statistical techniques we can use.
E)the part of a theory that explains what research knows about the topic.

Question 53

Margot wants to examine how student nurses change in their orientation towards patients over the course of their three years in nursing school.She is particularly concerned with following changes within the same individuals.It would be best to use a

A)trend study.
B)cohort study.
C)panel study.
D)cross-sectional study.
E)group

Question 54

Nate wants to make some causal assertions in his cross-sectional study about the effects of high school involvement on violence among young adults (all the people he studied are in their early 20s).He can approximate a longitudinal study by

A)using path analysis.
B)using age differences.
C)following the same individuals over time.
D)making logical inferences based on the time order of his variables.
E)he cannot approximate a longitudinal study

Question 55

William Robinson,a sociologist,found that during the 1930s there was a positive relationship between the literacy rate and percentage of the population that was foreign born.If you concluded on this basis that your neighbor,Yasmine,who is a foreign-born resident,has a higher literacy rate than other native-born residents,you would be committing the

A)individualistic fallacy.
B)ex post facto fallacy.
C)ecological fallacy.
D)part-whole fallacy.
E)ecological reductionism.

Question 56

Criminologists often examine the relationship between supervision and delinquency.When they do so,they might examine Table A or Table B.


Table A illustrates a ________ condition; and Table B illustrates a _______ condition.

A)necessary; necessary
B)necessary; sufficient
C)sufficient; necessary
D)sufficient; sufficient

Question 57

A second researcher decides to select a LARGE sample of citizens in a community to interview before a new factory is built in the community.This researcher does not believe there is a need to re-interview these citizens at a later date.This researcher has engaged in _________ research design.

A)trend
B)cross-sectional
C)panel
D)age
E)cohort

Question 58

When the relationship between the number of firefighters and the amount of fire damage disappears once we control for the size of the fire,we say that "size of fire" is a ___________ variable.

A)moderator
B)spurious
C)correlational
D)causative
E)valid

Question 59

The final stage of the research process involves

A)observations.
B)date processing.
C)analysis.
D)writing.
E)application.

Question 60

Sampling is a way to learn about ______ by obtaining information from _______ of a larger population.

A)a larger population, the entire membership
B)a larger population; a subset
C)a subset of a population; the entire membership
D)a subset of a population; a subset
E)one person; a subset

Question 61

A problem that plagues panel studies specifically is:

A) time series.
B) selection bias.
C) panel mortality.
D) panel covariance.
E) none of these choices are correct.

Question 62

__________ mortality is a problem for a specific form of longitudinal study,in which the participants drop out of the project or disappear completely.

A) cohort.
B) panel.
C) trend.
D) longitudinal.
E) cross-sectional.

Question 63

Correlation between two variables means that

A)the dependent variable changes proportionally with the independent one.
B)there is no relationship at all between the independent and dependent variables.
C)only independent variables can be correlated.
D)the independent variable causes the dependent variable.
E)the dependent variable causes the independent variable.

Question 64

A research proposal describes what you intend to accomplish and how.

Question 65

Dr.Jordan chronicles people's attitudes toward an upcoming property tax levy.Jordan is doing explanatory research.

Question 66

Research designs are descriptive,explanatory,or exploratory-never more than one.

Question 67

Which of the following research studies would be considered a cohort study?

A)interviewing the same employees of a bank every month for two years
B)conducting a one-time survey in a college lecture hall
C)surveying teenagers now, then 20 year olds in a decade, then 30 year olds a decade after that
D)interviewing police officers now regarding their educational background, and then interviewing police officers again in 2 years
E)examining a selection of textbooks to analyze how conflict theory is presented

Question 68

The purpose of the literature review is to:

A)define the sample and population of interest
B)outline the research method to be used
C)analyze data
D)familiarize the reader about the topic and what is known about it
E)apply the result of research to the world

Question 69

The period of a research study in which data is actually collected is what step?

A)operationalization
B)sampling
C)data processing
D)analysis
E)observation

Question 70

Descriptive research answers the question "What's so?" and explanatory research answers the question "Why?"

Question 71

When a researcher has only cross-sectional data but wants to apply longitudinal strategies,he or she may be able to if:

A) participants are able to remember past events.
B) age differences can be discovered in the cross-sectional data.
C) time order of variables is explicitly clear.
D) cohorts are available.
E) all of these choices are correct.

Question 72

Researchers ignore previous work on a topic so that their research can be original.

Question 73

A major shortcoming of exploratory studies is that they seldom provide satisfactory answers to research questions.

Question 74

In recent years,the popularity of mixed models has

A) decreased.
B) increased.
C) stayed the same.
D) fallen dramatically.
E) mixed models are no longer used.

Question 75

Longitudinal studies may be either trend or cohort studies,but not panel studies.

Question 76

The overall group in which a smaller portion is selected for study is known as the:

A)sample
B)population
C)group
D)cohort
E)family

Question 77

Panel attrition is comparable to experimental mortality.

Question 78

Akerlof and Kennedy (2013)suggest all but which of the following ways in which social research can be used to design and evaluate programs to fight environmental degradation?

A) isolate those who disagree.
B) increase personal agency.
C) facilitate emotional motivation.
D) communicate supportive social norms
E) promote favorable attitudes

Question 79

Arianna is planning to study the future criminal behavior of individuals currently enrolled in a diversionary juvenile program.What type of research method may she use?

A)cross-sectional
B)trend
C)cohort
D)panel
E)experimental

Question 80

The smaller group that is selected from a larger one for closer study in research is the:

A)population
B)party
C)sample
D)body
E)subset