When I'm 64 (2006) / Chapter Skim
Currently Skimming:
Measurement: Aging and the Psychology of Self-Report
Measurement: Aging and the Psychology of Self-Report
Pages 219-230
The Chapter Skim interface presents what we've algorithmically identified as the most significant single chunk of text within every page in the chapter.
Select key terms on the right to highlight them within pages of the chapter.
From page 219... ...
. As will become apparent, the cognitive changes associated with normal human aging can profoundly affect the processes underlying selfreports of opinions and behaviors, giving rise to age-sensitive context effects (see the contributions in Schwarz, Park, Knäuper, and Sudman, 1999)
|
From page 220... ...
220 MEASUREMENT: AGING AND THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SELF-REPORT ATTITUDE REPORTS Social psychologists and public opinion researchers have long been aware that attitude reports are highly context dependent (for reviews see Schuman and Presser, 1981; Sudman et al., 1996)
|
From page 221... ...
Response Order Effects Increase with Age A second major source of context effects in attitude measurement is the order in which response alternatives are presented. Response order effects are most reliably obtained when a question presents several plausible response options (see Schwarz, Hippler, and Noelle-Neumann, 1992; Sudman
|
From page 222... ...
. When presented in writing, respondents elaborate on the implications of the response options in the order presented.
|
From page 223... ...
Replicating the pattern of the divorce findings, this recency effect was more pronounced for older than younger respondents, with differences of 24 versus 8 percentage points. When the response options were presented in writing, however, older as well as younger respondents were more likely to choose Washington, DC, when it
|
From page 224... ...
224 MEASUREMENT: AGING AND THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SELF-REPORT 68.2 70 61.0 58.9 60 57.1 50 41.4 38.6 40 37.8 36.4 31.4 31.8 Percentage 30 20 10 0 18-54 55+ 60+ 65+ 70+ Age (years) Position: second Position: last FIGURE 3 Response order effects as a function of age.
|
From page 225... ...
NORBERT SCHWARZ 225 was presented first rather than last. Importantly, this primacy effect under a visual mode was of comparable size for both age groups.
|
From page 226... ...
Response Alternatives An alternative estimation strategy draws on the frequency scale presented by the researcher (for a review see Schwarz, 1999a)
|
From page 227... ...
. In combination, these findings suggest that respondents of all ages draw on the response alternatives when they need to form an estimate of how often they do something.
|
From page 228... ...
228 MEASUREMENT: AGING AND THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SELF-REPORT CONCLUSIONS As this review illustrates, minor changes in question wording, question format, and question order can profoundly influence the results obtained in sample surveys as well as in the psychological laboratory. Whereas researchers like to assume that respondents know what they believe and do, and can retrieve the proper information from memory, respondents usually have to compute the relevant answers on the spot, and this renders the answers highly context dependent.
|
From page 229... ...
Clark (Eds.) , Research methods in personality and social psychology: Review of personality and social psychology, (vol.
|
From page 230... ...
Cognitive Psychology, 18, 225-252. Withey, S.B.
|
Key Terms
This material may be derived from roughly machine-read images, and so is provided only to facilitate research.
More
information on Chapter Skim is available.