Reserach Questions

[Guest]

Hi all I'm new to this so I hope I'm doing this right. I'm in need of help for my research project. I have to create a likert scale type questionaire on a topic (I've chosen my staffs attitutude to teamwork and communication). I'm sruggling on questions to ask coz i need to have aprox 50 questions. Any help would be really appreciated.

 

Thanks in advance.

[Guest]

I don't know what a Likert scale type questionairre looks like. Can you give us an idea of what questions you've thought of already and maybe that will help us come up with some more.

Also sure someone else who has done this type of research will be along soon to add their advice.

 

A warm welcome to the forum xavier, and best wishes for your study, it sounds interesting.

 

Peggy

[HappyMaz]

First a question or two of my own!

 

Have you chosen this topic because there are difficulties within your staff team, or just because you're interested in this particular topics?

 

I think 50 questions in a questionnaire is a lot - to be honest if it was me filling it in I probably wouldn't last the course. Unless of course you're looking for lots of questions so you can choose the really good ones!

 

Have you covered teamwork and communication in one of your uni modules? Have you looked at the benefits of good communication and teamwork on the outcomes for the children you care for? If so you could use this information to base your questions on by making statements which reflect what you've learned, and then ask respondees whether they agree. This might make it easier for you to choose which questions to use rather than doing the thinking yourself - and it would have the benefit of seeing whether practitioners' opinions match the research/theory about the subject.

 

You might also phrase some questions/statements positively and some negatively so that a different response is necessary. This will reduce the risk of respondees getting into a rhythm of always answering 'not sure' or 'agree' to every question, especially towards the end of the questionnaire.

 

Is your questionnaire only supposed to use the likert scales? Can you ask respondees to explain why they agree or disagree? I sometimes find that questionnaires that ask me to grade things without being able to explain my answer a bit frustrating - but that could just be me!

 

Not sure how helpful that was - but I'm sure there will be lots more views soon!

 

Maz

[Guest]

First a question or two of my own!

 

Have you chosen this topic because there are difficulties within your staff team, or just because you're interested in this particular topics?

 

I think 50 questions in a questionnaire is a lot - to be honest if it was me filling it in I probably wouldn't last the course. Unless of course you're looking for lots of questions so you can choose the really good ones!

 

Have you covered teamwork and communication in one of your uni modules? Have you looked at the benefits of good communication and teamwork on the outcomes for the children you care for? If so you could use this information to base your questions on by making statements which reflect what you've learned, and then ask respondees whether they agree. This might make it easier for you to choose which questions to use rather than doing the thinking yourself - and it would have the benefit of seeing whether practitioners' opinions match the research/theory about the subject.

 

You might also phrase some questions/statements positively and some negatively so that a different response is necessary. This will reduce the risk of respondees getting into a rhythm of always answering 'not sure' or 'agree' to every question, especially towards the end of the questionnaire.

 

Is your questionnaire only supposed to use the likert scales? Can you ask respondees to explain why they agree or disagree? I sometimes find that questionnaires that ask me to grade things without being able to explain my answer a bit frustrating - but that could just be me!

 

Not sure how helpful that was - but I'm sure there will be lots more views soon!

 

Maz

 

In answer to your question Yep ive got some problems with communication between staff and the committee and i thought the reserach could also help with resolving this issue.

 

The tutor wants 50 questions and then we are to decide on the best questions to use.

 

your advise is brilliant i never thought of actually using information to write the questions THANKS

 

I can only use the likert scale and for the second part of the research I have to devise a more complex questionaire, where one acn elaborate on their answers

[beth1]

Yes my tutor has asked for 50 questions well they can think again! Didn't realised that it was to pick the best questions though, thanks for that information. Sorry I can't help you more I have had hardly any lectures on this subject!

 

Good luck.

 

Beth

[Guest]

Is the the 50 question likert scale a pilot study? In my experience you will have to say why you did not include all of the results in your data analysis. I think 50 questions is far too much and you will probably find that your staff and others dont have the time to fill it in and wont want ot spend their own time doing it. I would talk to your tutor about this, ask why you have to use 50 and then ask her if you have to present it in your findings/data. I think part of doing the research project is about learning from your mistakes, I did two for my degree and although i made a lot of mistakes in the first one and learnt a lot, I still made quite a few in the one that followed!

 

You need key questions that are going to answer your research quesiton. Or your study might be to prove the opposite. Perhaps your tutor wants you to write 50 questions without carrying out the questionaire, have you read Roberts-Holmes or Bell?

Do you have a critical friend? I had a lot of help from this forum and also my partner who qucikly pointed out my closed questions!! Maybe write 10 questions that you think will prove/answer your question and then answer them yourself and see what you think you could do with the answers to show how it answers your question (or not).

 

Peggy, I used a likert scale in my questionnaire which you repsonded to, do you remember?

 

1 2 3 4 5

 

Please circle if you remember, 1 being:total blank, 3 being:vaguely, 5 being: Yes of course!! ; )

 

I think Mr Likert came up with the idea, but it does limit your participants creativity in their answers.

[Beau]

You could ask whether they feel comfortable voicing their disagreement over things or challenging bad practice. To counter this you could also ask whether they feel it is disrespectful to challenge someone senior to them. If they are open to listening to opposite points of view from others? Again it's good to have something at the opposite spectrum as a 'check' that they are answering truthfully, so maybe asking about their feelings if someone challenges them. Something about the importance of finding out the facts before drawing conclusions. You could ask some questions to discover their preferred communication methods - some people like to talk face to face, some only feel comfortable in smaller groups, others might prefer to write things down. Alot of people don't realise how important tone and body language are to communication, so you could form some questions about this too. Maybe how they deal with conflict with colleagues?

 

In terms of teamwork, again everyone has different preferences. I actually like to work by myself but some people like to have the input from others, so asking about this could be a couple of questions. Also, whether they feel their skills or experience are valued in the team?

 

Just a few random thoughts here - hope it helps!

 

You won't need 50 different ideas as you should include questions which say the same thing but from the opposite viewpoint. There will also be quite a lot of overlapping questions.