Self-Report

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Self-Report

Advantages

  • Good Validity - you ask people directly and get their opinions and what they think.
  • Lots of data both qualitative and quantitative and can be gathered quickly and cheaply from different groups and large sample.
  • Can be easily replicated - reliable.
  • Closed questions are quantifiable - they can be summarised into tables and graphs and compared.

Disadvantages

  • Fixed choice questions lack flexibility and forces people to answer - lowers validity.
  • Social desirability bias
  • Acquiescence - yes more then no or just agree.
  • Set response.
  • Question may be misunderstood - lowers reliability.
  • Low response rate.

Evaluation

Using self report is the easiest and fastest way to collect data and it can be used to collect both types. However it can be subject to things like social desirability bias where people want to seem good and even leading questions in interviews. When using self-report it is important to use a variety of question types and no leading questions and make questions relevant to the topic.

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