EDF 5481
Educational Research
Midterm Examination
Summer 2013
Directions:
Identify the letter of the choice that best completes the statement or answers the question and place it in the
space next to the item number on your answer sheet.
____
____
____
____
____
____
____
1. Charles Darwin used his specimens and observations to arrive at hyptheses which he then tested
empirically. This strategy for inquiry is now known as
a. inductive reasing.
b. scientific method.
c. deductive reasoning.
d. falsification.
2. Differences between members of the various social classes in Europe in the period of the Crusades
were widened by the introduction of
a. fireplaces.
b. the Arabic language.
c. books.
d. roses.
3. Galileo’s primary method of inquiry differed from that of Aristotle in that Galileo used
a. emperical observations while Aristotle used only logic.
b. deductive reasoning while Aristotle used only inductive reasoning.
c. scietific method while aristotle did not use scientific method.
d. manipulation of what he was observing while Aristotle merely observed.
4. The major weakness of the syllogism is that
a. it takes a long time for the researcher to gather specific facts that will be used to
arrive at a conclusion.
b. it can never be used to prove ideas.
c. it is impossible to know if major premises are true.
d. it is impossible to know whether minor premises are true.
5. During the medieval period, the Catholic Church in Europe incorporated certain Classical Greek
philosophers into their doctrine because
a. they believed that people living during that period were very smart.
b. these writers were early Chrstians.
c. the names of these writers could be found in the Bible.
d. these writers wrote about crusades to the Holy Land.
6. A principal difference between the scientific approach and inductive reasoning is that the scientific
approach involves
a. observation.
b. data collection.
c. data analysis.
d. hypothesis testing
7. In deductive reasoning, if the major and minor premises are true, then the conclusion
a. may be true.
b. is necessarily true
c. must be subjected to empirical study before its truth or falsity can be determined.
____
d. none of these are true.
8. Which one of the following steps in undertaking a research study most likely involves the use of
authority?
a. Selection of a question for research
b. Review of literature
c. Data collection
d. Data analysis
Exhibit 1-2
A teacher wants to know which method of teaching German verb forms can be expected to result
in the greatest student achievement in that skill. Each of the answer options provided lists a
procedure that the teacher could follow. Choose the option that best answers the question.
____
____
____
____
9. Refer to Exhibit 1-2. Which of these procedures best fits the definition of authority as a source of
knowledge?
a. The teacher could employ various methods in her teaching until she gets a "feel"
about which one works best.
b. The teacher could administer achievement tests to students taught by the different
methods and compare the test results.
c. The teacher could systematically begin with known facts about the relationship
between the teaching of foreign language and language achievement and logically
determine what would be true concerning the results of various teaching methods.
d. The teacher could ask an eminent professor of German at a respected university.
10. An assumption of science is
a. events are random.
b. events are controlled by intelligent design.
c. knowledge is derived from direct and objective observation.
d. scientific theory is irrefutable.
11. Study A investigated the effect of intelligence on the speed of completion of a problem-solving
task. Study B investigated the effect of an early stimulating environment on the intelligence of
children. The variable intelligence is the
a. independent variable in Study A and the dependent variable in Study B.
b. dependent variable in Study A and the independent variable in Study B.
c. independent variable in both Study A and Study B.
d. dependent variable in both Study A and Study B.
12. Which of the following represents the usual sequence of steps in the quantitative research process?
a. Reviewing the literature; formulating a problem; defining the variables
operationally; developing measuring instruments; gathering data.
b. Stating the hypothesis; reviewing the literature; stating operational definitions of
the variables; developing measuring instruments; gathering data.
c. Stating a problem; reviewing the literature; stating a hypothesis; constructing
operational definitions of variables; developing measuring instruments; gathering
data.
d. Reviewing the literature; identifying the variables; stating a problem; gathering
data.
Exhibit 2-6
A researcher carried out an experiment with her freshman psychology students to answer the
question: "Does college students' rate of learning a series of cognitive tasks differ in regard to
gender and type of motivation (intrinsic or extrinsic)?"
____
____
____
____
____
____
____
13. Refer to Exhibit 2-6. What is the population?
a. gender
b. type of motivation
c. college students
d. rate of learning task
e. freshman psychology students
14. Refer to Exhibit 2-6. What is the manipulated independent variable?
a. gender
b. type of motivation
c. college students
d. rate of learning task
e. freshman psychology students
15. Experimental research, in contrast with nonexperimental research, focuses on
a. cause-and-effect relationships.
b. descriptions of phenomena.
c. prediction of phenomena.
d. naturalistic inquiry into relationships.
16. A qualitative researcher would view the concept of learning disability as
a. value-laden
b. value-free.
c. theory-free.
d. value-specific.
17. The difficulty with Bacon’s solution to the problem of finding out how many teeth a horse has is
that
a. there is no reason to think that the student counted the teeth of a representative
sample of horses.
b. it is very difficult to accyratekt count a horses teeth.
c. different horses may have have different numbers of teeth.
18. Which of the following statements best reflects an accepted practice of qualitative researchers?
a. Qualitative researchers exclude their personal beliefs and ideas about the topic of
the study.
b. Qualitative researchers approve of the ideas of the people they study.
c. Qualitative researches acknowledge and manage their subjectivity in the study.
d. Qualitative researchers exclude from the write-up all data that does not fit the
patterns they have identified.
19. All of the following are explicit goals of qualitative research EXCEPT to
a. provide a detailed description of a particular group of people.
b. explain how to broadly generalize from the project findings.
c. identify and explain meanings of themes in the data.
d. explain how the people studied understand their experiences.
____
____
____
____
____
____
____
20. Because the qualitative researcher is the primary research instrument
a. the qualitative researcher should not establish a relationship with study
participants.
b. qualitative researchers should use numbers whenever possive to prove their
conclusions.
c. qualitative researchers should be careful to control for as many variables in their
studies as possible.
d. qualitative research reports should expicitly articulate researchers’ assumptions
and points of view.
21. In qualitative research, data analysis generally
a. is repeated throughout the data collection effort.
b. is done using deducstive reasoning.
c. seeks proof of a previously stated hypothesis.
d. begins after data collection.
22. The statement of the problem for research should
a. always be in question form.
b. always be in a declarative form.
c. include the source and significance of the problem.
d. clearly indicate what is to be investigated.
23. Which one of the following reasons is not an acceptable reason for replicating a research study?
a. One's view of the relationship between the variables of the study is different from
the findings of the study.
b. One suspects that the subjects of the study do not represent the population under
investigation.
c. One wants to see if the use of different instruments for measuring the variables of
the study would produce the same results.
d. One wants to investigate the applicability of the results of a study to a larger
population.
24. To be researchable, an educational problem must be one that
a. can be attacked empirically.
b. has practical implications.
c. can be conducted in one's own school.
d. is approved by the school authorities.
25. An assistant superintendent in charge of public relations wants to make a content analysis of the
two local newspapers to determine the adequacy of their coverage of school news. This proposed
research problem does not meet the criterion that the problem should
a. be one that is researchable.
b. be suitable for the particular researcher.
c. be one for which the data necessary to answer the question are available.
d. not be too broad or general.
e. lead to new problems and further research.
26.Which of the following shows the recommended way to state a quantitative research problem?
a. The learning of arithmetic concepts among elementary school students
b. The mathematics curriculum at Central High School
c. A study of the attitudes toward math among middle school students
d. What is the relationship between students' math skills and their quantitative
reasoning skills?
e. All of the above
____ 27. The basic ethical question for all researchers to consider when choosing a problem is
a. Will anyone else have access to the data I collect?
b. Will any physical or psychological harm come to anyone as a result of my
research?
c. Is the use of deception justified by the study's educational value?
d. Is this study exempt from federal ethical guidelines?
____ 28. The best synonym for theory is
a. construct
b. abstraction
c. explanation
d. hypothesis
e. idea
____ 29. Qualitative inquiry states that human behavior
a. can be generalized from setting to setting.
b. can be generalized if the variables are controlled.
c. is bound to the context of the setting.
d. is universal in nature.
____ 30. The percent of immigrant children in the public schools of many communities has greatly
increased in the last decade. What type of qualitative research would you recommend to help
educators understand these immigrant children and the discontinuity that might exist between the
family and school cultures?
a. historical analysis
b. content analysis
c. ethnography
d. case study
e. survey
____ 31. An investigator wishes to determine how different ethnic groups are represented in current
elementary reading texts. This type of research is called
a. historical research.
b. case study.
c. content analysis.
d. trend study.
____ 32. An investigator wants to do an in-depth analysis of a school that has recently adopted block
scheduling. What kind of qualitative study would this be?
a. Case study
b. Grounded theory
c. Ethnography
d. Phenomenological study
____
____
____
____
____
____
____
33. The case study's most serious limitation is
a. data on individuals are less intensive than on surveys.
b. generalizations from case studies are difficult and risky.
c. no attempt is made to study interrelationships of various factors.
d. quantitative data rather than qualitative data are produced.
34. Which of the following is not a purpose of the search for related literature?
a. Avoiding the unintentional replication of previous projects
b. Defining the boundaries of one's field
c. Determining whether the project would make a meaningful contribution to the
field
d. Displaying an exhaustive knowledge of one's field
e. Learning which research procedures have been useful to other researchers
35. To find a doctoral dissertation, which is most appropriate to search?
a. ERIC
b. Dissertation Abstracts International
c. PsycINFO
d. PsycArticles
36. Mental Measurements Yearbook would be useful to
a. compare purposes of several reading comprehension tests.
b. find the administration price for a standardized test.
c. select a test for motor functions.
d. all of the above
e. none of the above
37. To find what journal articles have referenced a particular author, you would use
a. ERIC.
b. Encyclopedia of Educational Research.
c. Sociological Abstracts.
d. PsycInfo.
e. Social Sciences Citation Index.
38. To use ERIC to search a particular topic, you need to know:
a. a specific article title associated with the topic.
b. an author's name associated with the topic.
c. keywords associated with the topic.
d. all of the above.
39. To find all materials indexed by a given resource that deals with deaf education outside of the
United States, you would use:
a. deaf education and United States.
b. deaf education or United States.
c. deaf education, not United States.
d. none of the above.
____
40. To decide when to stop collecting material in a literature review, one should:
a. continue until no more material can be found.
b. determine if there is an appropriate proportion of information from both journal
and book sources.
c. examine the foundation laid by the review for one's question.
d. observe the number of sources retrieved.
Exhibit 5-5
Evaluate the adequacy of each of the following statements as a scientific hypothesis.
____
____
____
____
____
41. Refer to Exhibit 5-5. Children who attend Sunday School are more likely to go to Heaven than
children who do not.
a. inadequate, less than two variables
b. inadequate, no statement of relationship
c. inadequate, not testable
d. adequate hypothesis
42. Refer to Exhibit 5-5. Children from homes of a high socioeconomic status will make more positive
evaluations of a variety of school-related concepts than will children from homes of low
socioeconomic status.
a. inadequate, less than two variables
b. inadequate, no statement of relationship
c. inadequate, not testable
d. adequate hypothesis
43. When testing a hypothesis, a researcher uses
a. inductive reasoning to determine the expected consequences
b. deductive reasoning to determine the expected consequences.
c. both a and b.
d. neither a nor b.
44. The null hypothesis that is appropriate to state with a directional research hypothesis asserts that
a. the independent variable has no effect.
b. chance alone is responsible for the observed differences between conditions.
c. the independent variable does not have an effect in the direction predicted by the
research hypothesis (H1).
d. b and c.
45. A researcher stated the following hypothesis: The new instructional program in middle school
social studies will produce more enlightened voters than the traditional program. This hypothesis
most violates the criterion that hypotheses should be
a. worthy of investigation.
b. testable.
c. stated as concisely as possible.
d. consistent with the existing body of knowledge.
____
____
____
____
____
____
____
46. The tentative speculations that researchers make about the relationship between the variables in a
study are called
a. constructs.
b. theories.
c. hypotheses.
d. principles.
47. A directional hypothesis would be most appropriate when
a. both outcomes are equally likely.
b. both outcomes are equally useful.
c. either outcome would lead to change.
d. one outcome would lead to change; the other would not.
48. Consider the hypothesis: The severe weather that has hit the United States in recent months is
punishment for the decline in morals in our society. This is an example of a hypothesis that is
a. falsifiable.
b. parsimonious.
c. not falsifiable.
d. confirmable.
e. testable.
49. Educational researchers test the generalizability of research findings already reported by
a. deduction.
b. induction.
c. replication.
d. description.
50. In which of the following types of research is a hypothesis most likely to "emerge" following
observation?
a. Correlational
b. Quasi-experimental
c. Qualitative
d. Quantitative
e. Inferential
51. If your professor is only interested in the test performance of students in her class, the class is her
a. population
b. random sample
c. biased sample
d. nonprobability sample.
52. A researcher can guarantee the representativeness of the sample by:
a. using stratified random sampling.
b. employing simple random sampling procedures.
c. using systematic sampling procedures.
d. using the whole population.
Exhibit 7-1
Choose the type of sample that matches the following characteristics of sampling procedures.
____
____
____
____
____
____
____
53. Refer to Exhibit 7-1. Only the first case is randomly selected.
a. simple random.
b. stratified.
c. cluster.
d. systematic.
54. Refer to Exhibit 7-1. Individuals from defined subgroups are sampled.
a. simple random.
b. stratified.
c. cluster.
d. systematic.
55. Refer to Exhibit 7-1. All individual cases have a non-zero chance of being selected.
a. simple random.
b. stratified.
c. cluster.
d. systematic.
56. If a research finding is found to be statistically significant it:
a. confirms the research hypothesis.
b. suggests the findings are significant contributions to the theory being tested.
c. suggests that similar results would be found if another sample was tested.
d. all of these are true.
57. If a test has been found to be statistically significant at the .05 level, the probability of getting this
result by chance alone is:
a. exactly 5 times out of 100.
b. equal to or more than 5 times out of 100.
c. equal to or less than 5 times out of 100.
d. more than 5 times out of 1,000.
58. "Do athletes who include imaging their success as part of their practice do better than athletes who
do not include imaging?" The null hypothesis is:
a. athletes who image do better than athletes who do not image.
b. athletes who image do worse than athletes who do not image.
c. athletes who image do not differ from athletes who do not image.
d. the population mean of athletes who image is greater than the population mean of
athletes who do not image.
59. If a research study concludes that a new computer-based reading program teaches students how to
read more quickly than the old method:
a. a Type I error could have occurred.
b. a Type II error could have occurred.
c. both errors could have occurred.
d. neither error could have occurred.
____
____
____
____
____
____
____
60. Which one of the following statements is true?
a. Type I errors are inherently more serious than Type II errors.
b. Type II errors are inherently more serious than Type I errors.
c. The relative seriousness of a Type I or a Type II error is a judgment.
d. Typically in behavioral sciences, Type II errors are regarded as more serious.
61. An administrator will implement a new science curriculum if there is good evidence that it is more
effective than the present curriculum. Otherwise he will continue with the present curriculum. The
administrator should use a:
a. directional test.
b. nondirectional test.
c. difference test.
d. nondifference test.
62. The greatest statistical power occurs when:
a. the sample is small and heterogeneity is small.
b. the sample is small and heterogeneity is large.
c. the sample is large and heterogeneity is small.
d. the sample is large and heterogeneity is large.
63. The probability that a statisticl test of signficance will correctly indicate that we should reject a
false null hypothesis is referred to as the test’s
a. significance.
b. direction.
c. power.
d. falsification.
64. Increasing the probability that a statistical test will reject a true null hypothesis (Type 1 error) will
a. increase the power of a statistical test.
b. decrease the power of a statistical test.
c. increase the probability of mhaking a Type 2 error.
d. have no effect on the power of a statistical test or of making a Type 2 error.
65. On a standardized mathematics test the reliability coefficient is reported to be .76. From this
information one could best determine
a. the extent to which the test scores are correlated to classroom achievement in
mathematics.
b. the extent to which errors of measurement have influenced the test scores.
c. the extent to which the test is a representative sample of relevant concepts in math.
d. on the average, the number of points pupils' scores will change when given an
equivalent test.
66. The standard error of measurement is based on the test's
a. validity.
b. reliability.
c. objectivity.
d. difficulty.
e. discriminability.
Exhibit 9-4
Following is a list of testing practices. Assuming other things are equal, indicate whether the
practice would lower reliability, raise reliability, or neither.
____
____
____
____
____
____
____
67. Refer to Exhibit 9-4. Changing from a multiple-choice test to an essay test covering the same
materials.
a. lower reliability
b. raise reliability
c. neither raise nor lower reliability
68. Refer to Exhibit 9-4. Adding 10 items similar to those already in the test.
a. lower reliability
b. raise reliability
c. neither raise nor lower reliability
69. Refer to Exhibit 9-4. Removing ambiguous items from the test.
a. lower reliability
b. raise reliability
c. neither raise nor lower reliability
70. Refer to Exhibit 9-4. Adding 10 items to the test that everyone answers correctly.
a. lower reliability
b. raise reliability
c. neither raise nor lower reliability
71. A test designed to measure achievement motivation proved to be very consistent but to have no
relation to other measures of motivation or teachers' ratings of motivation. The test is
a. valid and reliable.
b. reliable but not valid.
c. valid but not reliable.
d. neither valid nor reliable.
72. Which of the following represents the most direct evidence that a test is a valid measure of a
construct?
a. The test predicts success in college.
b. The test scores correlate highly with teachers' ratings.
c. The test includes a representative sample of the skills taught in the course.
d. The test of trait Y places individuals into categories that were predicted from the
theory of trait Y.
73. A language aptitude test is administered to 50 students who are entering an honors French course.
After one semester, their scores from the final examination in the French course are correlated with
the scores from the language aptitude test. The resulting correlation coefficient would provide
what kind of evidence of the test's validity?
a. Content
b. Test-retest
c. Concurrent
d. Criterion-related
____
____
____
____
____
____
____
74. One way to describe the reliability of a criterion-referenced test is in terms of the consistency with
which individuals
a. obtain the same scores on a retest.
b. maintain their same relative position in the group on a retest.
c. obtain the same scores on the odd and even halves of the test.
d. achieve mastery on two different forms of the test.
75. Three individuals report the same information about a student's personal characteristics. Their
agreement is indicative of a high degree of
a. validity.
b. interrater reliability.
c. halo effect.
d. standardization.
76. Which of the following is not an internal consistency measure of reliability?
a. Split-half
b. Coefficient alpha
c. Kuder-Richardson
d. Coefficient of staability
77. A test has high reliability if
a. it measures what it is supposed to measure.
b. it has a high correlation with an appropriate criterion.
c. individuals maintain their relative ranks when the test is administered a second
time.
d. it is a representative sample of the content domain.
78. In validating an inventory measure of need to achieve, a researcher correlated the scores from the
inventory with a projective technique known to measure need to achieve. This is an example of
a. content evidence.
b. external evidence.
c. convergent evidence.
d. divergent evidence.
79. The ability of a music aptitude test to differentiate among individuals who are known to differ in
music ability provides evidence of the test's
a. objectivity.
b. reliability.
c. validity.
d. consequential usefulness.
80. One would not use the Kuder-Richardson 20 coefficient to estimate the reliability of a
comprehensive multiple choice final examination in a beginning psychology course because
a. Kuder-Richardson 20 requires two forms of a test.
b. the items are not of equal difficulty.
c. the items cover various content areas and skills.
d. all of these are true.
e. b and c.