Chapter 3: Sex Research

Question 1

a group of people a researcher wants t study and make inferences about

Answer 1

population

Question 2

a part of a population

Answer 2

sample

Question 3

an excellent method of sampling in research, in which each member of the population has an equal chance of being included in the sample

Answer 3

random sample

Question 4

an excellent method of sampling in research, in which each member of the population has a known probability of being included in the sample

Answer 4

probability sampling

Question 5

the problem that some people will refuse to participate in a sex survey, thus making it difficult to study a random sample

Answer 5

problem of refusal or nonresponse

Question 6

a bias in the results of sex surveys that arises when some people refuse to participate, so that those who are in the sample are volunteers wo may in some ways differ from those who refuse to participate

Answer 6

volunteer bias

Question 7

a sample chosen in a haphazard manner relative to the population of interest; not a random or probability sample

Answer 7

convenience sample

Question 8

purposely giving false information in a survey

Answer 8

purposeful disortion

Question 9

a method for testing whether self-reports are reliable or accurate; participants are interviewed (or given a questionnaire) and then interviewed a second time sometime later to determine whether their answers are the same both times

Answer 9

test-retest reliability

Question 10

a method of data collection in which the respondent fills out questionnaires on a computer

Answer 10

computer-assisted self-interview (CASI)

Question 11

an ethical principle in research, in which people have a right to be informed, before participating, of what they will be asked to do in the research

Answer 11

informed consent

Question 12

an ethical principle in research, which holds that the risks of participation should be distributed fairly across groups in society, as should the benefits

Answer 12

justice principle

Question 13

an approach to analyzing the ethics of a research study, based on weighing the costs of the research (the participants’ time, stress to participants, and so on) against the benefits of the research (gaining knowledge about human sexuality)

Answer 13

cost-benefit approach

Question 14

a method for acquiring a sample of people in which existing participants suggest names of future participants to be recruited

Answer 14

snowball sampling

Question 15

a set of procedures used to make valid inferences about text

Answer 15

content analysis

Question 16

in content analysis, the correlation or percent of agreement between two coders independently rating the same texts

Answer 16

intercoder reliability

Question 17

a collection of naturalistic, holistic methods, including participant observation and in-depth interviewing, in which the results are conveyed not in numbers but in words

Answer 17

qualitative

Question 18

a research method used to provide a description of a human society

Answer 18

ethnography

Question 19

a research method in which the scientist becomes part of the community to be studied and makes observations from inside the community

Answer 19

participant-observer technique

Question 20

a study in which the researcher does not manipulate variables but rather studies naturally occurring relationships (correlations) among variables

Answer 20

correlational study

Question 21

a type of research study in which one variable (the independent variable) is manipulated by the experimenter while all other factors are held constant; the research can then study the effects of the independent variable on some measured variable (the dependent variable); the researcher is permitted to make causal inferences about the effects of the independent variable on the dependent variable

Answer 21

experiment

Question 22

reaching the conclusion that one factor actually causes or influences an outcome

Answer 22

causal inference

Question 23

the average of respondents’ scores

Answer 23

mean

Question 24

the middle score

Answer 24

median

Question 25

the percentage of people giving a particular response

Answer 25

incidence

Question 26

how often a person does something

Answer 26

frequency

Question 27

a number that measures the relationship between two variables

Answer 27

correlation