Surveys need to be sufficiently large to gather meaningful data. If the sample is too small or targets only one segment of the population (a group of things being studied) the data analysis may be misleading.
Surveys done by telephone are not random samples because they exclude those people who don’t have a telephone or have unlisted numbers. Updating the information in our text to today’s telephone use, even more people would be eliminated because many people have dropped having a land line and are using their cell phones exclusively instead. They often do not list their cell phone numbers in traditional directories. Perhaps the only way a random sample of people having telephones could be conducted would be to direct the telephone companies to randomly link the survey to the telephone bill since everyone who owns a telephone, has to pay for service.
The experiment done by the two psychologists to test people’s honesty was interesting. The envelopes labeled “research study had the highest rate of return: 91% ( 68/75) The lowest rate of return was recorded for envelopes seeming to contain money: 68% (102/150) The reason the empty enveloped were marked, ” This is a research study…” encouraged people to follow through with mailing it rather than throwing it away because it looked empty.
The envelopes were dropped near mailboxes, so it would be logical that people would pick the envelopes up and deposit them without even looking at them closely so one would assume the rate of return would be high. Because the rate of return of envelopes with blank paper (80%) and fake money (68%) were returned and the study was designed to see if people would take money that didn’t belong to them, they may have been counted even though it is dishonest to open another person’s mail. When it came to returning empty envelopes all demographic groups had high rates of return: poor – 88%, middle – 96% and wealthy – 88%
Blank paper envelopes had similar results: poor – 86%, middle – 74% and wealthy – 80%
Returns for those with fake money: poor – 56%, middle – 66% and wealthy – 82%. There was a greater discrepancy especially between the poor and wealthy groups. Because there seemed to be coins inside, it may be a greater temptation to actually open the letter. Perhaps some of the poor people didn’t recognize the money as fake so they decided to keep it. When it comes to money, it’s a greater temptation to actually open the letter for some than others.
Kris,
I wonder how the phone companies would handle those disposable phones. Do those folks get bills? I think they come with so many minutes and then if you don’t renew you can just toss them. At least that is my understanding.
Judy
Kris,
I too noticed that with phone survey at this day and age it is important that we take into consideration that some people no longer use land lines and they only use cell phones. Therefore the population sampled would be skewed.
Lisa