AO3 - Questionnaires

• One strength of questionnaires is that they can tackle sensitive issues such as homosexuality (or AO2) – as participants data can remain anonymous, by the researcher not asking for their name. This means participants answers may be more likely to be honest as they may be happier to disclose sensitive information when they are anonymous, increasing the internal validity. Unlike an interview, where the researcher is present and the participant may not feel comfortable answering sensitive questions truthfully face to face, reducing the internal validity.
• Another strength of questionnaires is the reduction of investigator effects as the researcher does not have to be present whilst the participants completes the questionnaire. Therefore researcher’s response to the participant’s answer is not visible and their characteristics will not influence the participant’s answers. Unlike an interview, where the researcher has to be present, therefore this increases the internal validity of the questionnaire.
• Another strength of questionnaires is that they can be given to a large quantity of people as the researcher does not have to be present when the participants complete the questionnaire, increasing the generalisability of the findings. Unlike an interview, where the researcher has to be present for each interview, limiting the amount of people the research can be conducted on, therefore increasing the external validity of questionnaires.
• A weakness of questionnaires is that they could lead to social desirability bias. (E.g. asking a mother is her child aggressive – they will say no, *AO2*, what is the ppt likely to lie about?). Therefore lowering the internal validity of the research. Whereas in an interview the researcher is present and it often takes place face to face which may reduce the participants socially desirable responses as they may find it more difficult to lie face to face. However, this could be minimised by making the questionnaire anonymous.
• A further weakness is misinterpretation of questions. For example a participant may not understand a question and as the researcher is not present, they cannot ask for clarification meaning they could leave the question or give invalid information. Moreover, the researcher could misinterpret/not understand the participants answer and again cannot ask for clarification, lowering the internal validity. Unlike in an interview, where the researcher is present so the participant/researcher can ask for clarification, increasing the internal validity.
• A strength of the use of open questions producing qualitative data is that they provide in-depth, rich detailed data which provides greater understanding of the content/behaviour in question (AO2).
• A weakness of the use of open questions to produce qualitative data is that they are open to researcher bias as participant’s responses (AO2) will be open to the subjective interpretation of the researcher.
• A strength of closed questions to produce quantitative data is that they are easier to analyse and collate the data allowing comparisons to be made between groups of people enabling conclusions to be made about behaviour (AO2).
• A weakness of using closing questions to produce quantitative data is that it lacks depth and insight into behaviour (AO2) in question, therefore the answers could lack validity.
• A further weakness of using closed questions to produce quantitative data is that it could be open to response bias where participants reply in a similar way, e.g. always ticking ‘yes’ or answering at the same favoured end of a rating scale, lowering internal validity.