Ninth Edition CoverGraziano & Raulin
Research Methods (9th edition)

Chapter 13 Exercises
A Second Look at Field Research:
Field Experiments, Program Evaluation,
and Survey Research

The following exercises are designed to give you hands-on practice of the skills learned in this chapter.

  1. Assume that you have conducted a nonequivalent control-group study and are now looking at the results. Draw several figures illustrating possible outcomes from a simple two-group study similar to the graphs found in Figure 13.2 in the textbook. (Do not reproduce the graphs that are in Figure 13.2.) Then, identify which of the hypothetical outcomes would be readily interpretable and which would not be interpretable.

  2. Listed below are the ages of 100 people who define a population that you are to study.

    22	19	38	64	17	29	24	37	27	41
8	57	32	39	17	7	13	69	43	33
27	22	64	57	13	11	29	17	34	19
46	34	37	15	13	61	42	38	26	23
2	41	54	75	11	31	21	65	19	38
69	10	48	25	56	32	5	66	29	37
44	24	74	54	64	73	13	37	3	37
17	21	54	29	37	71	62	41	12	39
27	7	38	20	65	53	42	74	59	49
4	15	26	36	44	52	63	71	8	29
    For this population of 100 people, compute the mean age. Then, using the table of random numbers from the textbook, randomly draw 10 separate samples of five people, and compute the mean age for each sample. Sort the population by age, and set up five approximately equal size strata based on age. Now, select 10 samples using a stratified random sample technique. Sample size should be five participants (one participant from each strata). Compute the mean for each of these samples. Compare the ten samples that you drew using simple random sampling with the ten samples drawn using stratified random sampling. On average, how close are the sample means to the population mean in each procedure?

  3. Imagine that your task is to evaluate the effectiveness of a college work-study program. The program's purpose is to provide meaningful employment and financial support for students while at the same time giving them an opportunity to develop useful and marketable skills. Identify some useful dependent measures for an evaluation of this program. Be sure that your dependent measures adequately capture the potential positive and negative effects of such a program. Describe how you would conduct such a program evaluation, including sampling techniques, actual design used, and procedures for statistical analysis.

  4. Design a survey instrument to evaluate the knowledge and attitudes of participants about some current issue (e.g., AIDS and AIDS prevention). Be sure to include demographic characteristics that you think might be relevant in predicting a person's knowledge and/or attitudes. Word your items carefully to avoid confusion. Finally, outline some of the questions you would want to address in the analysis if the survey were actually carried out.