A: To see if gender affects the size of car a person drives
Directional hypothesis: men will drive larger cars and women will drive smaller cars. This may be due to role models in the media, car adverys show men driving large powerful cars, while women are passengers or driving small city cars.
P: In this study I chose a busy road near by to carry out my observation. As pp's were unaware of this, it makes my observation covert. Before I went out to do this I had to operationalise the variables - the car size, so that I knew what I was categorising as a small or large car. I then went outside and tallied each car that went past for 5 minutes and noted if the driver was male or female.
This was an opportunity sample.
F: Chi squared
C:
Evaluation
This study was not generalisable as I only used one road in Plymouth. I also did my observation at lunchtime, this means many people may still have been at work, so only part time workers, unemployed or retired people were included. If I did my results at a different time I may find other findings e.g. more women driving large cars at school pick up time.
This study could be repeated as it followed a standardised procedure as I operationalised car size. I worked with a partner who had the same findings, showing we had inter-rater reliability.
This study has low ecological as it is not known if the person who was driving the car, owned the car. Some people have two cars and when the parent picks up the children they might take the big car. As this is usually the mother, it could affect who I counted in my tally for large and small car.
My observation was covert, meaning pp's did not give consent or have the right to withdraw. My study however was ethical as I did my observation in a public place and took no personal details such as number plate, so it is confidential.
Directional hypothesis: men will drive larger cars and women will drive smaller cars. This may be due to role models in the media, car adverys show men driving large powerful cars, while women are passengers or driving small city cars.
P: In this study I chose a busy road near by to carry out my observation. As pp's were unaware of this, it makes my observation covert. Before I went out to do this I had to operationalise the variables - the car size, so that I knew what I was categorising as a small or large car. I then went outside and tallied each car that went past for 5 minutes and noted if the driver was male or female.
This was an opportunity sample.
F: Chi squared
C:
Evaluation
This study was not generalisable as I only used one road in Plymouth. I also did my observation at lunchtime, this means many people may still have been at work, so only part time workers, unemployed or retired people were included. If I did my results at a different time I may find other findings e.g. more women driving large cars at school pick up time.
This study could be repeated as it followed a standardised procedure as I operationalised car size. I worked with a partner who had the same findings, showing we had inter-rater reliability.
This study has low ecological as it is not known if the person who was driving the car, owned the car. Some people have two cars and when the parent picks up the children they might take the big car. As this is usually the mother, it could affect who I counted in my tally for large and small car.
My observation was covert, meaning pp's did not give consent or have the right to withdraw. My study however was ethical as I did my observation in a public place and took no personal details such as number plate, so it is confidential.