Retrospective studies with survey data: Problems in social science and epidemiology research

Large-scale population surveys are a valuable source of data for epidemiologists and social scientists interested in retrospective studies of health conditions. It may not be apparent that such data sources present many problems, one of which is data reliability. It can be shown statistically that where a relation exists between two variables measured with no or minimum error, this relation vanishes if either or both variables have sizable error components. Thus such data have little utility in assessing simple relations, let alone in making causal inferences. Another problem is that unreliability or measurement error affects the sensitivity and specificity of a measuring instrument in unpredictable ways. Solutions to the problems caused by data unreliability are suggested.     

Measuring Agreement in Ordered Rating Scales

Ordered rating scales are one of the most frequently used question formats in large-scale surveys. Analysts of the responses to such questions often find themselves in need of describing the degree of agreement (concentration, consensus) of the answers to such questions. For that purpose they commonly use standard deviations of the response distributions, or measures based on these (such as the coefficient of consensus defined by Granberg and Holmberg, 1988), or the coefficient of variability, etc. This paper demonstrates that such measures are inappropriate for this purpose because they misrepresent what they are supposed to measure: the `peakedness' of a distribution. As an alternative a measure of agreement A is proposed. This measure is a weighted average of the degree of agreement that exists in the simple component parts – layers – into which any frequency distribution can be disaggregated, and for which agreement can be expressed in a straightforward and unequivocal way.     

DETECTING AND REMOVING DISCRIMINATION UNDER EQUAL OPPORTUNITIES POLICIES

Abstract. This paper surveys part of the recent voluminous literature on the economics of discrimination, focusing on two key questions. First, how should discrimination be measured and can in fact unambiguous estimates be derived, as the basis for detecting where discrimination is present and setting in train measures to eliminate it? Second, to what extent has the implementation of equal opportunities legislation improved the relative standing of women and minority workers in the labour force? This section includes a discussion of the likely effects of recent changes in the law such as the equal value amendment in the UK or the introduction of comparable worth in the USA. The survey concludes that our ability to detect discrimination at all precisely is still rudimentary and consequently policy measures are likely to be inefficient for this reason.     

Print versus electronic surveys: a comparison of two data collection methodologies

This paper compares the responses of consumers who submitted answers to a survey instrument focusing on Internet purchasing patterns both electronically and using traditional paper response methods. We present the results of a controlled experiment within a larger data collection effort. The same survey instrument was completed by 416 Internet customers of a major office supplies company, with approximately 60% receiving the survey in paper form and 40% receiving the electronic version. In order to evaluate the efficacy of electronic surveys relative to traditional, printed surveys we conduct two levels of analysis. On a macro-level, we compare the two groups for similarity in terms of fairly aggregate, coarse data characteristics such as response rates, proportion of missing data, scale means and inter-item reliability. On a more fine-grained, micro-level, we compare the two groups for aspects of data integrity such as the presence of data runs and measurement errors. This deeper, finer-grained analysis allows an examination of the potential benefits and flaws of electronic data collection.Our findings suggest that electronic surveys are generally comparable to print surveys in most respects, but that there are a few key advantages and challenges that researchers should evaluate. Notably, our sample indicates that electronic surveys have fewer missing responses and can be coded/presented in a more flexible manner (namely, contingent coding with different respondents receiving different questions depending on the response to earlier questions) that offers researchers new capabilities.     

A review of statistical methods in the analysis of data arising from observer reliability studies (Part I)*

Summary This paper reviews research situations in medicine, epidemiology and psychiatry, in psychological measurement and testing, and in sample surveys in which the observer(rater or interviewer) can be an important source of measurement error. Moreover, most of the statistical literature in observer variability is surveyed with attention given to a notational unification of the various models proposed. In the continuous data case, the usual analysis of variance (ANOVA) components of variance models are presented with an emphasis on the intraclass correlation coefficient as a measure of reliability. Other modified ANOVA models, response error models in sample surveys, and related multivariate extensions are also discussed. For the categorical data case, special attention is given to measures of agreement and tests of hypotheses when the data consist of dichotomous responses. In addition, similarities between the dichotomous and continous cases are illustrated in terms of intraclass correlation coefficients. Finally, measures of agreement, such as kappa and weighted-kappa, are discussed in the context of nominal and ordinal data. A proposed unifying framework for the categorical data case is given in the form of concluding remarks.     

REVIEW ESSAY STUDIES ON TRANSITIONS: MEANINGS AND METHOD

This article analyses the link between research methodology and knowledge generation. It argues that the selection of a method of data collection and analysis determines the potential boundaries and depth of knowledge that can be generated. Choice of methodology, therefore, has major constraining or liberating potential. This is illustrated in an examination of three recent texts on transition. The first of these adopts an occupational psychology approach based on large-scale surveys. It is argued that this approach runs the risk of ignoring key existential issues. The two other texts analysed are a clinical psychology approach to the major transitions in work and power occasioned by the introduction of new information technologies, and a novel examining key transition episodes in the ‘lives’ of its main protagonists. These two texts, it is suggested, provide an extremely rich source of data and are a pleasure to read. The article ends with an argument for the redefinition of the boundaries that constitute knowledge in management and organization studies.     

Predicting business unit performance using employee surveys: monitoring HRM-related changes

Organisations are increasingly using strategy tools such as workforce scorecards to keep track of human resource management related change processes that have been implemented and the effects of these on business unit performance. However, in this area, the challenge of finding appropriate indicators, establishing temporal relationships and providing useful management information still remains. Using longitudinal archival data from 171 branches of a large financial service organisation, this study examines to what extent employee surveys can serve as a predictor of better financial performance at the branch level. Results from a series of models in AMOS (Analysis of Moment Structures) showed that a significant part of branch profits could be predicted using employee surveys after correcting for prior profits. Based on extrapolation to all branches of this organisation, the changes in employee survey scores predict higher yearly profits of 178 million euros (17.9 per cent of the total yearly profits) across the entire company. Implications for research and practice are discussed.     

Factors affecting the nature and effectiveness of subjective revision in sales forecasting: An empirical study

Recent empirical results have indicated that sales forecasts obtained from a quantitative model can be improved through subjective revision undertaken by management. This study seeks to determine the extent to which the improvement in forecast performance is dependent upon the individual revising the forecast rather than the specific product under consideration. As any improvement in the forecast is a direct consequence of the adjustment effected, differences in the nature of revision among the individuals concerned and between different types of product are also examined. The results reveal no statistically significant differences between the managers involved in revision activity in terms of their ability to improve the forecast; on the other hand, significant differences in the number of forecasts improved were found between different types of product. As far as the nature of subjective revision is concerned, the results show a significant variation both between different types of product and between managers. Further, the improvement in forecast performance obtained through revision was found to be positively related to the relative size of the adjustment applied.     

Organizational innovation: The challenge of measuring non-technical innovation in large-scale surveys

Although the implementation of innovative organizational concepts is considered to be highly important for a company's competitiveness, so far there has been little research on possible approaches to measure and monitor organizational innovations in large-scale surveys. Based on an item-oriented typology of organizational innovations which serves as the precondition for a common understanding, we describe and compare how organizational innovations have been measured through existing surveys in Europe. Using a large-scale survey comprising data of 1450 German manufacturing companies, we show how these different approaches lead to significantly different results regarding the organizational innovativeness of companies within one and the same sample. We derive four implications for the future measurement and monitoring of organizational innovations. Our findings contribute to the further development of an adequate methodology for an organizational innovation monitoring system.     

A Two‐Step Procedure to Measure Representativeness of Internet Data Sources

So far, statistics has mainly relied on information collected from censuses and sample surveys, which are used to produce statistics about selected characteristics of the population. However, because of cost cuts and increasing non‐response in sample surveys, statisticians have started to search for new sources of information, such as registers, Internet data sources (IDSs, i.e. web portals) or big data. Administrative sources are already used for purposes of official statistics, while the suitability of the latter two sources is currently being discussed in the literature. Unfortunately, only a few papers devoted to statistical theory point out methodological problems related to the use of IDSs, particularly in the context of survey methodology. The unknown generation mechanism and the complexity of such data are often neglected in view of their size. Hence, before IDSs can be used for statistical purposes, especially for official statistics, they need to be assessed in terms of such fundamental issues as representativeness, non‐sampling errors or bias. The paper attempts to fill the first gap by proposing a two‐step procedure to measure representativeness of IDSs. The procedure will be exemplified using data about the secondary real estate market in Poland.     

Longitudinal Surveys and the Study of Occupational Mobility: Panel and Retrospective Design in Comparison

The paper discusses the extent to which longitudinal surveys are able to expose occupational mobility and the dynamics of these processes. It compares two survey designs: the repeated panel design and the retrospective life history design. This comparison details the strength and the weaknesses of the two designs. The paper particularly calls attention to the unique features of the two designs with respect to the exploration of occupational mobility – pointing to three general problems of quantitative social research: item-nonresponse, design effects of single and multi-measurement occasion, and the strong assumption that researchers and respondents share the same definition of concepts. The main conclusion of the paper is that both designs offer unique opportunities to study social change, yet the differences between the two should be kept in mind when choosing the data set for particular research questions.     

Assessing social support networks in cross-national comparative surveys: Measurement issues

In recent years many cross-national comparative surveys, such as Gender and Generation Programme, International Social Survey Programme, European Quality of Life Survey, or General Social Survey, have included assessment of social support networks. Generally, two approaches were used; the name generator approach and the role relation approach. As more cross-country surveys are conducted every year, it may seem reasonable to use such data sets, since they provide high quality comparisons across countries. However, one should pay close attention to the measurement instruments, as these may cause unintentional but systematic variability in the observed data. While the data from each survey can be of high quality ??per se??, we claim that results from these surveys are not comparable, owing to their different measurement approaches and survey instruments. In this paper we present data from several experiments which show that scientific findings from these surveys depend significantly on questionnaire design.     

Are top human resource specialists 'strategic partners'? Self-perceptions of a corporate elite

Despite the existence of various large-scale surveys of human resource specialists, there has been little research focusing specifically on the top cohort of HR practitioners. In addition, the surveys offer little insight into the ambiguous, but important questions associated with the strategic management process in large, complex corporations. This article reports a study of the qualifications, work histories, role orientations and strategic contributions of the most senior HR specialists in the New Zealand business sector. These elite practitioners typically demonstrate a 'dual background' in specialist HR activities and line management, and strongly subscribe to Legge's notion of 'conformist innovation'. As in the United Kingdom, they tend to focus primarily on the management of managers and, to a lesser extent, the management of industrial relations. Their work is increasingly integrated with other spheres of the business such as quality management. Whether their contribution is regarded as 'strategic' depends on the model of strategic management that informs the question. This paper argues that the survey-based studies have inappropriately adopted 'outside-in' models of strategic management which privilege marketing notions and assume that 'formulation' is more strategic than 'implementation'. The work of these senior HR specialists is more fairly assessed under a conception of the strategic problem which balances external and internal concerns. Given the present realignment of strategy theory, the challenge facing these HR specialists is that of developing frameworks for corporate planning and performance analysis which attribute a more central role to the critical elements of HRM.     

小区域地图GPS导航仪设计与实现

为便于人们在旅游区、大型游乐城等无交通路线易迷失的小区域游览,文中以宏晶8位单片机为核心,通过串口通信接收GPS模块信息,实现了地理坐标与自制地图对应关系的小区域导航仪。该导航仪应用测试表明,在5-10米精度范围内对于大建筑物定位准确,能够用于自制小区域地图的导航。     

Aantekeningen bij de herziening van de methodiek der prijsindexcijfers van het levensonderhoud

Momentarily (fall 196o) the Netherlands Central Bureau of Statistics is revising its price indexnumbers of family living. Some features of this revision are summarized below.
The old series is based on an expenditure pattern of 1951, whereas the new series will be calculated according to an expenditure pattern of 1959/'60. The latter data will be derived from a budget survey held among 250 households of manual and clerical workers consisting of 4 persons and grossing between four and eight thousand guilders a year (para. 6). The period covered was April 1959 till April i960.
The author indicates the way in which the varieties of the budget items to be covered by the monthly price surveys are chosen (para. 7). He discusses the principles and results of determining the number of price quotations (para. 8).
The choice of the municipalities in which price data will be collected is explained. An outline is given of the organisation of the new surveys apparatus (para. 14).     

Opening up open-ended survey data using qualitative software

This article considers the contribution that qualitative software can make to ‘opening up’ open-ended question (‘OEQ’) data from surveys. While integrating OEQ data with the analysis of fixed response items is a challenge, it is also an endeavour for which qualitative software offers considerable support. For survey researchers who wish to derive more analytic value from OEQ data, qualitative software can be a useful resource. We profile the systematic use of qualitative software for such purposes, and the procedures and practical considerations involved. The discussion is illustrated by examples derived from a survey dataset relating to environmental risk in the UK.     

Hierarchical Models in Environmental Science

Environmental systems are complicated. They include very intricate spatio-temporal processes, interacting on a wide variety of scales. There is increasingly vast amounts of data for such processes from geographical information systems, remote sensing platforms, monitoring networks, and computer models. In addition, often there is a great variety of scientific knowledge available for such systems, from partial differential equations based on first principles to panel surveys. It is argued that it is not generally adequate to consider such processes from a joint perspective. Instead, the processes often must be considered as a coherently linked system of conditional models. This paper provides a brief overview of hierarchical approaches applied to environmental processes. The key elements of such models can be considered in three general stages, the data stage, process stage, and parameter stage. In each stage, complicated dependence structure is mitigated by conditioning. For example, the data stage can incorporate measurement errors as well as multiple datasets with varying supports. The process and parameter stages can allow spatial and spatio-temporal processes as well as the direct inclusion of scientific knowledge. The paper concludes with a discussion of some outstanding problems in hierarchical modelling of environmental systems, including the need for new collaboration approaches.     

大学生综合测评系统的设计与实现

本文是基于WEB的一个典型应用,主要运用了ASP.NET技术,SQLSEVER2005数据库,采用B/S模式。基本功能有:系统维护,学生信息数据输入,反馈信息输入,学生成绩数据计算,数据备份与事件记录,数据查询和打印输出等,其中学生成绩数据计算模块、反馈信息输入模块与数据查询和打印输出模块是系统的重点模块。该系统利用计算机进行学生综合测评管理代替了原有的人工管理方式,节省大量的人力、物力,并且易于操作,可以更加方便地对学生成绩数据进行管理和计算,极大地提高了管理的效率。     

Counting angels: a comparison of personnel and HR specialists

This article uses data from the 1998 Workplace Employee Relations Survey to explore the extent to which the characteristics and job‐related activities of specialists who use the title 'human resources' differ from those who use the title 'personnel'. The results demonstrate that specialists using the HR title are better qualified than those using the personnel title and they are more involved with strategic planning. Additionally, employee development is more likely to be included in strategic plans, and there is slightly greater evidence of devolution of responsibility to supervisors where the specialist uses the HR rather than the personnel title. Finally, several practices commonly associated with HRM, such as personality tests, attitude surveys and off‐the‐job training, are more likely to have been adopted in workplaces that have an HR specialist than in those that have a personnel specialist.     

Survey as a Source of Statistics and Factors Affecting the Quality of Survey Statistics

Survey-taking, which normally involves sampling, has become a major data collection vehicle along with other means of obtaining raw data such as administrative systems and systems of special returns. This paper discusses the major aspects that should be addressed in conducting sample surveys. The proper treatment of these aspects is essential in ensuring production of quality statistics.