RESEARCH YHTOMIT

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Methodology

Data Collection Technique

The study was conducted in two parts. The first part of the study was an intensive

literature review of the existing biometrics literature to learn what other researchers have

identified as impacts to biometrics acceptance. Additionally, the literature review identified

previous surveys that researchers had conducted and those surveys and their results were used to

develop the second part of the study.

The second part of the study was an anonymous online survey that was designed to

collect and analyze participants’ opinions of biometrics and their thoughts on acceptable uses of

the technology. The survey was created and administered using Google’s forms functionality on

Google Docs. The survey consisted of five demographic questions, 19 multiple choice

quantitative questions, and four fill-in-the-blank qualitative questions. The results of the survey

were compiled in Google Docs using their spreadsheet functionality. A copy of the survey

questions is included in this report as Appendix A.

The five demographic questions were multiple choice and designed to gather information

such as the age of the participant, level of education, gender, and experience with biometrics.

This data was used in the analysis to identify differences in opinions based on demographic

characteristics. Additionally, the demographic information was used to compare the sample

makeup to the overall population of the United States in order to validate the results of the

survey. The 19 quantitative questions were divided into five separate groups of questions

designed to gather data for different aspects of the study. Each question had five answers for the

participant to choose from. The first section consisted of four multiple choice questions

designed to measure the participants level of comfort with using biometrics technology in the

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different situations in each question. The participants chose between the five answer options of

very comfortable, somewhat comfortable, unsure, somewhat uncomfortable, or very

uncomfortable. The second section consisted of five questions with the same options for the

participants to choose from as the first section. This section was designed to measure the

participants’ level of comfort with different biometric modalities. The third section consisted of

four questions designed to measure the participants’ acceptance with different uses of biometrics.

The participants chose between the five answer options of very acceptable, somewhat acceptable,

unsure, somewhat unacceptable, or very unacceptable. The fourth section consisted of four

questions with the same answer categories as the third section. This section was designed to

measure the participants’ level of acceptance with different implementations of biometrics

technologies. The fifth section consisted of two questions designed to capture the participants

overall opinion of biometrics and their roles in security and convenience. To answer these

questions, the participants chose between the answer options of very significantly, somewhat

significantly, unsure, very little, or none.

The four qualitative questions were designed to gather any suggestions that the

participants had without being constrained by the limit or format of the multiple choice options

of the quantitative design. Additionally, they were designed to capture the general attitude and

opinion of the participants in their own words. The first narrative question aimed to identify

locations where biometrics would be beneficial. The second question was designed to identify

instances and situations where biometrics were needed for a specific purpose. The third question

aimed to identify specific criteria that needed to be met in order to use biometrics technology in

an acceptable manner. The fourth question was designed to gather criteria for the unacceptable

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use of biometrics and identify when biometrics collection would be objectionable to the survey

participants.

Subjects and Setting

The survey participants were solicited from a small population of people known by the

author and the faculty advisor. Participation was solicited through the use of notifications on the

social networking site, Facebook, and emails sent to faculty and students of American Military

University as well as co-workers, friends, and family of the author. The notifications and emails

explained the purpose of the survey, requested their participation, and provided the link to the

online survey. There were no identification numbers assigned to the survey links and no way of

identifying who participated in the survey as it was completely anonymous with the exception of

the demographic information which had little to no identifying information.

The solicitation on Facebook was conducted as a status message with a request for the

author’s “Facebook friends” to complete the survey with a link to the survey location. Of the

almost 300 acquaintances on Facebook, it is expected there was a five to ten percent participation

rate in the survey. The 300 individuals ranged from over 18 years old to over 80 years old, in a

variety of occupations, with varying levels of education, and geographically located all over the

United States. The author’s co-workers are all employed by the United States Coast Guard,

located in Washington, D.C., between the ages of 25 years old and 60 years old, and most have

at least a Bachelor’s degree. There were less than 30 co-workers that were asked to participate in

the survey. The students and faculty of American Military University were all well-educated

with all of them having at least a Bachelor’s degree. Additionally, they were all over 24 years

old, employed in many different occupations, and geographically located all over the United

States.

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Statistical Analysis

For the quantitative portion of the study, each question had five choices of answers. Each

of those answers was converted to a value between one and five. Additionally, each of the

questions was assigned a question number for easier charting and analysis. Then, the results of

the survey were placed into an Excel spreadsheet where they were studied and analyzed. First,

the average of each question was calculated. Then, the standard deviation and variance were

calculated. Once those values were calculated for the entire population, the spreadsheet was

used to filter the results by demographic characteristics and the same calculations were

conducted for the different characteristics. Those results were compiled and placed in tables

where they were subsequently graphed. The researcher compared the results in each category

against the overall average and against the other categories to develop assumptions about the

demographic subsets. Additionally, the researcher considered the number of participants from

each category when considering the significance of each subset’s average. If the category had a

small number of participants, its results were not given the same regard as a category with many

participants because the average of the smaller category could be more greatly impacted by the

answers of one or two participants. This would not lead to a fair and accurate categorization for

those demographic subsets.

Limitations of the Study

The study was limited by the amount of time available to complete it and the number of

participants that completed the online survey. As the study was conducted in order to complete a

thesis to fulfill a requirement for a Master’s degree program, the author was constrained by the

amount of time available in the course and in order to complete the study in time, the author used

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a small population of participants that would respond quickly. For this study, the survey was

open for two weeks and had 69 participants complete the questionnaire.

Another limitation in the survey was the potential lack of diversity in the participants and

the disparity with the larger population of the United States of America. The participants of the

study were predominately male with only 33% of the participants being female. According to a

2012 census study, almost 51% of the population of the United States was female (United States

Census Bureau, n.d.c). Additionally, an overwhelming number of the participants in the study

had obtained a higher level of education than the national average. Forty-one percent of the

participants had obtained a Master’s degree and 20% of the participants had obtained a Doctorate

degree while the national average in the United States was that 8.41% of the population had

obtained a Master’s degree and 1.68% had obtained a doctorate. Additionally, 35% of the survey

participants had obtained a Bachelor’s degree which was higher than the national average of

20.09% (United States Census Bureau, n.d.b.). Another disparity between the survey sample and

the population of the United States was the number of military members that participated.

Almost 28% of the participants in the survey were military which was much higher than the

national average of less than 1% of the population (National Public Radio, 2011). Also, the age

dispersion of the survey participants was not as varied as the population of the United States.

There were over three times the percentage of 25-34 year olds represented in the survey than in

the population of the United States. People between the ages of 25 and 34 comprise 13.4% of

the population of the United States. However, they made up 43% of the participants for the

survey. Similarly, 28% of the survey participants were between the ages of 35 and 44 years old,

but only 12.9% of the population of the United States are in that age range. The percentage of

survey participants between the ages of 45 and 64 years old was very close to the percentage of

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the United States population with 23% of survey participants and 26.5% of the U.S. population

falling in that range. Survey participants 65 years old and older were underrepresented in the

survey with only 6% of the participants falling in that age range when the national average is

13.4% of the population is 65 or older (United States Census Bureau, n.d.a). These limitations

can be attributed to the sample populations chosen for the survey and the method used to gather

data. Because the survey participants were solicited using online social media to reach out to

acquaintances of the author and emails were used to reach out to co-workers of the author and

students and employees of the American Military University, there was not much diversity

present in the participants.