Measuring People

(Variables & Samples)

NurZetty Sofia binti Zainuddin
Lecturer
Faculty of Allied Health Sciences, CUCMS
Recap…

Identify the
Develop the
research Research plan
hypothesis
question

Collect the Analyze the

Conclusion
data data
  Determine psychological construct
 Describe operational definitions
Learning  Identify difference of non-probability
Outcomes and probability sampling
Measuring People  Identify each sampling characteristic
(Variables & Samples)
 Determine sampling frame for group
research topic
Measuring Psychological
Construct
Measurement & Variable

 Variables – observation of changes

 Measurement - assignment of scores to individuals so that the scores represent some characteristic of
the individuals
Height Varies as you grow older
Time e.g to finish a jigsaw puzzle
Political party Not a measure but a category
Feelings Towards your parents, partners or sister/brother
Attitude Towards bullies, fox hunting or alcohol abuse
Anxiety ‘nervous’ behavior; internal feelings of fear etc

 When you want to measure psychological variables, we called it as psychometric

Some are easy to measure…(such as
age, weight, gender etc.)

Psychological measurements are most

difficult! They are not so
straightforward or simple to measure
Is there any correct way to
measure psychological
measurement?
There isn’t!
We can just assume that somewhere there is a real thing
that assuming is called as  PSYCHOLOGICAL CONSTRUCT
Psychological Construct

 Psychological construct represent tendencies to think, feel, or act in certain ways

 An informed, scientific idea developed or generated to describe or explain behavior
 It cannot be observed directly and often involve internal processes
 Example:
depression, stress level, aggression, self-esteem, intelligence, personality, anxiety, job satisfaction
 Making assumptions that construct can be measured

Internal State External, Observable Signs

Shaking hands
Biting lips
Anxiety
Faltering speech
Perspiration
Black Box

 Used to explain things we can’t see directly – psychological construct

 We treat human mind as a black box – you can’t see inside and probably never will but we can
assume the psychological construct are linked in a certain way, then test it with things that can
measure
 “We can’t observe x directly but if it exist then X should happen. Let see if it does”

Stimulus Response

Giving raise after Working hard in the

performance future
Operational Definitions

 We can’t see the internal states but we can measure the ‘signs’ of the states

 Operational Definitions –
 set of actions required to measure the signs
 definition of a variable in terms of precisely how it is to be measured
 These measures generally fall into one of three broad categories:

Self-reported measures Reports on their thoughts or feelings or actions

Behavioral measures Certain behavior of participant is observed by researcher
Physiological measure Changes in human physiology
Converging Operations

 Psychologist use multiple operational definitions

of the same construct—either within a study or
across studies
 Various operational definitions are “converging”
or coming together on the same construct Stress Level

 When scores based on several different

operational definitions are closely related to each
other and produce similar patterns of results, this
constitutes good evidence that the construct is
being measured effectively and that it is useful.
Population Sampling
 Sampling

 Sampling is the process of

selecting a representative group
from the population under study.
 Population – the entire
group of individuals to be
considered
 Sample - a subset of a
population that represent the
entire group as a whole
Why Do You Need To Do Sampling?

 Impossible to study every single person in a target population

 Psychologists select a sample or sub-group of the population that is likely to be representative of
the target population we are interested in
 But must make sure that the people in it are similar to the other members of the target population
 The more representative the sample, the more confident the researcher can be that the results can
be generalized to the target population.
Example

 You want to study how well does a

computer-based teaching technique in
learning mathematics among second year All second year student in
Malaysia
students Second year student in
CUCMS
Choosing Sampling Depend on your
objective, money, time,
Method statistical test and etc
Sampling Bias

Referred to as sample selection

bias

Errors that occur in research

studies when the researchers do
not properly select their
participants
Too many B’s taken from
the population!
Types of Sampling

Convenience Judgmental
Non-probability
Quota Snowball
Types of sampling

Simple Random Stratified

Probability
Systematic Cluster Random
 Non-probability Sampling
All members of population are not having equal chances
of being selected
Not safe to assume that the sample fully represents the
target population
Useful for pilot studies, case studies, qualitative research,
and for hypothesis development
Some researchers prefer this sampling technique
because it is cheap, quick and easy
Probability Sampling
All members in population has equal chances of being
selected
Can be used to estimate the population parameters -
representative of the entire population
Advantage of using probability sampling is the accuracy
of the statistical methods after the experiment
This method guarantees that the selection process is
completely randomized and without bias
Non-
probability
Sampling
“Not having equal chances”
Example: your target
population is second year
student. But you only pick your
friend in second year of diploma
psychology. Because it’s easy to
recruit your own friends to
answer your question.

How about second year

student of Physiotherapy?
Pharmacy? Medicine?
Convenience Sampling

 Subjects are selected just because they are easiest to

recruit for the study and the researcher
 Many researchers prefer this sampling technique because
it is fast, inexpensive, easy and the subjects are readily
available
 Example :
 using student volunteers as subjects 
 using subjects that are selected from a clinic, a class or an
institution
 choosing the first five names from the list of patients
 Other name : Opportunity Sampling
Quota Sampling

 Make a specific of subgroup within a population

 Assembled sample has the same proportions of
individuals as the entire population with respect to
known characteristics, traits or focused phenomenon
 Example:
 Total sample need is 100 subjects, divided to first year,
second year, third year and fourth year. Which each of year
of student is 25 subjects
 The problem is : what if the number of first year student
is more than final year?
 Overrepresented!
Judgmental Sampling

 Samples are chosen only on the basis of the researcher’s

knowledge and professional judgment
 Sometimes researcher believe that some subjects are more
fit compare to other individual
 Example:
 Dementia among elderly – but only choose the one who has
memory problem
 Consumer of particular product or service in some type of
market research
 Known as purposive sampling or authoritative sampling
Snowball Sampling

 After observing the initial subject, the researcher asks for

assistance from the subject to help identify people with a similar
trait of interest
 Asking your subjects to nominate another person with the same
trait as your next subject
 use this sampling method if the sample for the study is very rare
or is limited to a very small subgroup of the population.
 Example :
 Study on rare disease which hard to find a sample
Probability
Sampling
“Has equal chances”
Simple Random Sampling

 Each member of the population has an equal

chance of being selected as subject
 The entire process of sampling is done in a
single step with each subject selected
independently of the other members of the
population
 Fair way of selecting a sample
 Limitation - Need of a complete list of all the
members of the population.
Systematic Sampling

 Similar to random sampling but has TWO steps:

 Randomly picks the first item or subject from the
population.
 Researcher will select either by interval or every n'th
subject from the list
 Example:
 A population total of 100 individuals and need 12
subjects. He first picks his starting number, 5.
 Then the researcher picks his interval, 8. The
members of his sample will be individuals 5, 13, 21,
29, 37, 45, 53, 61, 69, 77, 85, 93.
Stratified Sampling

 Similar to systematic sampling but must divides

the entire population into different subgroups or
strata
 Then randomly selects the final subjects
proportionally from the different strata
 The strata must be non-overlapping
 Can representatively sample even the smallest and
most inaccessible subgroups in the population
 Have a higher statistical precision
Example Stratum A B C
Population 100 200 300
 You have 3 strata with 100,
size
200 and 300 population
sizes respectively. And the
researcher chose a sampling
Sampling 1/2 1/2 1/2
fraction of ½. Then, the fraction
researcher must randomly
sample 50, 100 and 150 Final sample 50 100 150
subjects from each stratum size
respectively
Cluster Random Sampling

 Multiple clusters of people are created from a

population where they are indicative of
homogeneous characteristics and have an equal
chance of being a part of the sample
 First, the researcher selects groups or clusters.
Then from each cluster, the researcher selects the
individual subjects by either simple random or
systematic random sampling.
 Types of Cluster Sampling
Single-
Two-stage Multiple stage
stage

Choose individual Choose individual

Choose few cities in Filter more to refine
Sampling is done just sample via Usually used for sample via
Choose cluster group School in Selangor Selangor (Cyberjaya, which school who has
once random/systematic crossing geographic random/systematic
Kajang, Bangi) IT course
sampling sampling
Stratified vs Cluster Sampling
 Let say…
 You want to study on stress
level and academic
performance among high-
schooler
 You find out there are 5
schools available in
Cyberjaya
Stratified Cluster
Each school you take You only choose 2
20% school out of 5
Even school A has more Then is either you want to
pupil than school B, you still do single/two/multi-stage
follow the population sampling (depends on you)
percentage that you decided. and choose individual
You get different number sample via
according to number of pupil random/systematic sampling
in each school
Recap….Types of Sampling

Convenience Judgmental
Non-probability
Quota Snowball
Types of sampling

Simple Random Stratified

Probability
Systematic Cluster Random
Recap…
Non-probability Sampling
All members of population are not having equal chances
of being selected
Not safe to assume that the sample fully represents the
target population
Useful for pilot studies, case studies, qualitative research,
and for hypothesis development
Some researchers prefer this sampling technique
because it is cheap, quick and easy
Probability Sampling
All members in population has equal chances of being
selected
Can be used to estimate the population parameters -
representative of the entire population
Advantage of using probability sampling is the accuracy
of the statistical methods after the experiment
This method guarantees that the selection process is
completely randomized and without bias
Kahoot.it
RM Race!
 Discussion

Based on your research topic, discuss in your group and answer the question
below:
1. Identify your variables and psychological construct
2. Identify which is your independent and dependent variable
3. Identify your population target and sample
4. Determine how to measure your variables
5. Search the questionnaire relevant to your research
6. Determine your sampling frame
Thank you
Question?