lab update

RSM802 Week 2 Lab -Survey Research

Format of the Questionnaire

Likert Items

The Dependent Variable for this survey, your attitude scale, will be measured using items you create. The survey should include 10 Likert items measuring the same attitude. A Likert item consists of a statement followed by a five-point rating scale on which the subject indicates the degree of agreement with the statement. For example:

	Strongly Disagree	Disagree	Neutral	Agree	Strongly Agree
The president is doing a good job on the war on terror	1	2	3	4	5

Negatively and Positively Keyed Items

To reduce the chances of a response set bias, you should have some of your items positively keyed and some negatively keyed. A positively keyed item is one where agreement means a positive attitude toward the issue being evaluated. For example, the preceding item is positively keyed because a high score (strongly agree) means that the subject is generally favorable toward how the president is handling the budget deficit.

In contrast, a negatively keyed item is one where disagreement indicates a positive attitude. For example:

	Strongly Disagree	Disagree	Neutral	Agree	Strongly Agree
The president is not doing a good job on the war on terror	1	2	3	4	5

Disagreement with this item indicates a generally favorable attitude toward how the president is handling budget cutting. Try, if you can, to have half of your items positively keyed and half negatively keyed.

Demographic/Predictor Items

In addition to the Likert items evaluating subjects’ attitudes, you should include items that will serve as the Independent Variable that evaluate something about the subjects. This can be a single item or a group of items. These items should be ones that you feel will correlate with the attitude measured on your questionnaire. Some examples, relevant to the above example, might be:

· Political party affiliation

· Educational level

· Occupation

· Income

· Gender

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