in psychology research theory-generating or theory-testing study does not have to rely of random sampling. Is this particular statement true and accurate? Does it mean , in psychological theory testing, convenience sampling is acceptable? Any academic article (s) supporting this? many thanks
From my own experience, battles can sometimes develop about sampling techniques. However, in fact, convenience sampling has been the main sampling technique in social psychology research (Kassin, Fein and Markus, 2011; Taylor, Peplau and Sears, 2003; Whitley and Kite, 2013).
To verify, check the “Method and participants” section in articles published in reputable psychology journals.
Just one example. A widely-cited and now seminal paper by Gardner and Lambert (1959), which in fact proposed one of the most influential theories of language learning motivation, used convenience sampling. All the participants in this study were school children in a Canadian school.
References
Gardner, R. C., & Lambert, W. E. (1959). Motivational variables in second-language
acquisition. Canadian Journal of Psychology / Revue Canadienne de Psychologie, 13(4), 266-272. doi:10.1037/h0083787
Kassin, S., Fein, S., & Markus, H. (2011). Social psychology (8th ed.). Wadsworth:
Cengage Learning.
Taylor, S. E., Peplau, L. A., & Sears, D. O. (2003). Social psychology (11th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
Whitley, B. E., & Kite, M. E. (2013). Principles of research in behavioral science (3rd
ed.). New York, NY: Routledge.
Please let me know if the following reference/site is helpful to you:
Theory-Testing in Psychology and Physics: A Methodological Paradox ...
www.fisme.science.uu.nl/staff/christianb/downloads/meehl1967.pdfCached
by PE MEEHLI - 1967 - Cited by 846 - Related articles
Theory-Testing in Psychology and Physics: A Methodological Paradox .... generate a random sampling distribution of the statistic ("t-test") employed in test-.
Dennis
Dennis Mazur
Thanks, Dennis. Those interested: be aware of deleting the word Cached at the end of the link; else it won' work.
To me it seems: The more theory-driven en presicely predicted the possible connections are in one's subject matter, the smaller and more convenience-sampled one's sample may be. The more purely explorative one's research is, the larger and more representative the sample must be. Especially in studying clustering of items or subjects.
- Badges
- Science topic
- Similar topics
- Psychology