Questionnaire Designing & Coding

(Lecture#3)

TIMES INSTITUTE MULTAN

DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC HEALTH
 What is data?
• Any raw information!

• For example??
 Types of Data

Primary Secondary
Data Data
How do we collect data??
 Data Collection Tools

Observation/Checklist

Interview

Questionnaire
 Questionnaire
• It is a formalized set of questions for collection
of information
• How it is different from interview
schedule/guide
• Questions can be
 Open ended
 Close ended
 Contingency and partial open
Continue
Contingency Questions
 Continue
• Partial open questions

• Example??
 Another Type of Question!
• The reason (s) for diabetes: (Tick as many as
possible):
1) High intake of sugar
2) Depression
3) Genes (transfer from parents)
 Administering you questionnaire!
• Self-administered

• Interview-administered

• And…?
 Structure of questionnaire!
• Section A-Independent variables

• Section B-Outcome variable/s

 These can be taken as a single question or

group of questions called “scale”
 Uni-Dimensional Vs. Multi-Dimensional
Scales
• Unidimensional scales measure one aspect

• Multidimensional constructs consist of two or

more underlying dimensions

• For instance, if we conceptualize a person’s

quality of health on basis of different domains
like physical, psychological and social
 Attitudinal Scales
• Attitude scales provide a quantitative
measurement of attitudes, opinions or values

• Thurstone scale-dichotomous
• Guttman scale-cumulative
• Likert Scale
Likert Scales
• Bad Question: How short was Napoleon?
• Good Question: How would you describe Napoleon’s
height?
• Bad Question: Should concerned parents use infant
car seats?
• Good Question: What concerned parents can do to
safe their child in a car?
• Bad Question: How satisfied are you with the pay and
work benefits of your job?
• Good Question:??
• Bad Question: Do you feel you have psychiatric
disorder?
• Good Question:??
Characteristics of Good Questions
Simple and clear

Should not be sensitive

Precise and short

Should not be leading

Should not be double barreled

 Selecting a Questionnaire
• Adopting a pre-existing questionnaire

• Adapting a pre-existing questionnaire

• Creating a new questionnaire

• Principal Component Analysis
 Validity & Reliability (Scale)
• Validity
Denotes the extent to which an instrument is
measuring what it is supposed to measure

• Reliability
• It is the consistency of measurements
 Validity
• Is the research providing answers to the questions for
which we are doing it?

• Is our questionnaire measuring what we think we are

measuring?

• But..who will decide standards for above mentioned

questions???
• Definitely we will need subject specialists
 Face Validity
• Do you feel sleep disturbance?
• Do you ever feel anxiety?
• Do you feel uncomfortable with unknown people?

• What type of research topic would it cover?..Can you

guess?
 Content validity
• It is the adequacy of coverage of the content
area being measured
• It is the degree to which the items/questions are
representative of characteristics (construct)
being tested

• Questionnaire to assess knowledge about

Primary prevention regarding eye health??
 Reliability
• Reliability means precision of measurements

• A reliable measure provides precise results that

can be expected to remain reasonably stable if
the measurement is repeated with same subject
 Internal Consistency
• When you are selecting scales to include in
your study, it is important to find scales that
are reliable
• SPSS calculates it in the form of Cronbach’s
alpha

• (to be continue in upcoming sessions)

 Importance of Pilot Study
• A pilot study is one of the important stages in
a research project
• It is conducted to identify potential problem
areas and deficiencies in the research
instruments
• Mostly 10% of calculated sample size
• It is also done to check reliability through
Cronbach alpha
Coding Responses of Questions!
 Continue
• SPSS understands ONLY digits
• We have to transform responses of questions
into digits

• It needs careful decision especially when

coding for outcome variable..why??
 An Example-Measuring PTSD
• Do you have memories about anything that
happened in past? (0/1/2)
• Do you have negative feelings about yourself?
(0/1/2)
• Do you have control over your negative
thoughts? (0/1/2)

 never (0)/sometimes (1)/always(2)

An Example of Code Book
 Interpreting your scale
• Consider a scale measuring you’re an outcome
with the help of ten questions; each with 5-
item response
• Taking it as quantitative

• Taking it as qualitative
 Median as cut-off
 Standard cut-offs
A Good Questionnaire with Perfect Coding
brings out“True Evidence”