Practice question · Multiple choice
Before you can study happiness you must decide what counts as happiness, a rating scale, hours smiling, a hormone. Why is that operationalisation step the one most likely to sink the study?
Hints
- Once the study is done, what does the p-value actually refer to, the concept, or the measure?
- Two teams study 'aggression'; one counts shouting, one counts hitting. Are they studying one thing?
Show the answer
D. Because every conclusion afterwards is about the measure, not the concept
Why
Everything downstream inherits the definition, and no analysis can widen it afterwards. This is construct validity, and it is why two studies of 'aggression' can disagree without either being wrong, they measured different things and used the same word.
Practise Reliability and Validity
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