22.01 Collecting data
After the government decided to increase the minimum retirement age, a news poll selected a group of people to ask their opinions on the changes.
Determine whether the following people should be represented to avoid sampling bias.
People in the community who have a wide variety of views, excluding politicians and policy makers.
People in the community who have a wide variety of views, even if they are not directly affected by the changes.
Only people in the community who would be directly affected by the changes.
A radio station conducts a poll asking its listeners to call in to say if they are for or against restrictions on scalpers selling tickets for gigs at a higher price.
Determine whether the following are the reasons why this is not an appropriate way to conduct a poll.
A large variety of people are likely to call.
A person can call more than once, so they could be counted more than once.
People with stronger views are more likely to call than those who don’t have a strong view.
A question is inappropriate for a survey given it fulfills any of the following criteria:
Question is unclear
Emotional language
Should be a "yes" or "no" question
Question is too personal
Using the criteria list, determine why each of the questions are inappropriate.
How many large electronic devices are in your home?
Many people have worked incredibly hard and even died making this bridge. Do you like the bridge?
What is your favourite breed of dog?
Determine whether the following questions are likely to give biased results or not:
Yvonne is asking people on her soccer team, "What's your favourite sport?"
Lachlan randomly selected people from his school to find about the school sports. He asked "What's your favourite school sport?"
Tricia randomly selected people from her school and asked, "The local AFL team is donating money to our school this term. What's your favourite sport?"
Lulu is interviewing people outside of a train station. She asks "Should the government spend more money on public transportation?"
Shadie is interviewing people about how shark nets are affecting shark attack numbers. He asks "Shark nets cost \$1\,000\,000 per year and barely help. Do you support shark nets?"
Write a possible question you could ask in order to find out the following information:
You want to gather information about how many people have had a dog as a pet.
You're interviewing students to find out how often they read.