Bias in Surveys

Conceptual Understanding

Decide if the following statement is true or false and explain your reasoning:

If bias is present in a sampling procedure, it can be overcome by dramatically increasing the sample size.

Answer explanation

This is false. If bias is present in your sampling method, increasing the sample size will not eliminate the bias—it will simply produce a larger dataset that amplifies the same biased results.

Conceptual Understanding

Decide if the following statement is true or false and explain your reasoning:

There is no such thing as a bad sample.

Answer explanation

There are countless ways to collect a biased sample. For example, asking teenagers if they think curfews should be abolished is likely to yield a very different perspective than asking parents or law enforcement officers.

Conceptual Understanding

Decide if the following statement is true or false and explain your reasoning:

Using the right sampling techniques effectively eliminates bias.

Answer explanation

This is incorrect. It is impossible to completely eliminate bias in any study. Researchers focus on minimizing bias as much as possible through careful design and methodology, but some degree of bias is always inevitable due to limitations in data collection or inherent factors in the study context...(oh, and there's the part about humans being fallible creatures that will always have flaws).

Conceptual Understanding

Decide if the following statement is true or false and explain your reasoning:

Voluntary response samples often underrepresent people with strong opinions.

Answer explanation

This is false. It's actually the opposite; voluntary response samples often OVER-represent people with strong opinions. Voluntary response bias occurs when a survey primarily attracts individuals with strong opinions, as they are the ones most motivated to respond. Those with neutral or weaker opinions are less likely to participate, leading to an overrepresentation of extreme viewpoints in the results.

Conceptual Understanding

Decide if the following statement is true or false and explain your reasoning:

Convenience samples often lead to undercoverage bias.

Answer explanation

This is a true statement. Convenience samples are easy to take, and don't intentionally seek to draw from a diverse cross-section of a population, which is what a sample SHOULD be doing. Undercoverage refers to leaving parts of the population out of your sample. So, for example, if you survey only your family and friends, you are leaving out MANY people. In the old days, when "phone books" were a thing, when you called people in the phone book you were leaving out people who didn't have a phone number.

Conceptual Understanding

Decide if the following statement is true or false and explain your reasoning:

Questionnaires with nonneutral wording are likely to have response bias.

Answer explanation

This statement is true because nonneutral wording is intended to provoke someone to answer a question a certain way, and intentionally influencing how a respondent answers a question contradicts the very purpose of showing interest in what someone is thinking.

Tags

CCSS.RL.5.6