No file available
To read the file of this research,
you can request a copy directly from the authors.
Improving Cross-Cultural Equivalence Through Scale-Specific Translation Guides: An Example Case of the Primals Inventory
Preprints and early-stage research may not have been peer reviewed yet.
Abstract
Despite sophisticated scale-generic guidance for adapting/translating self-report scales and widespread adherence to guidance, low invariance remains a problem in cross-cultural clinical research. This may be due to scale-specific translation challenges, and original scale-creation papers provide little information about item-writing choices. It is typically unexplained, for example, why important repeated terms are selected over synonyms, leaving translators in a lurch. To supplement scale-generic guidance, we specify conditions warranting the creation of scale-specific translation guides and offer a full exemplar guide concerning the Primals Inventory, a new measure of beliefs about the world’s general character (e.g., the world is dangerous) presumed to influence a variety of clinical outcomes. Primals Inventory-specific recommendations include how best to evoke the object of belief (e.g., world versus universe) and lessons learned from initial translation efforts (German and Italian). If this scale-specific guide proves useful, similar guides could be created for other scales, aiding cross-cultural research generally.
Supplementary resource (1)
ResearchGate has not been able to resolve any citations for this publication.
Researchers have begun to explore a category of beliefs called primals which concern the basic character of the world as a whole. After discussing primals' general significance, this chapter recommends the Primals Inventory (PI-99) to those seeking to measure them. The PI-99 was created by the first effort to empirically map all major primals individuals hold. Item generation efforts included, for example, the analysis of 80,677 tweets, the 840 most-frequently used adjectives in modern English, and 385 of the most influential texts in world history. Factor analysis identified 26 latent dimensions, with most variance explained by three main primals-informally called the Big Three-the beliefs that the world is Safe (vs. dangerous), Enticing (vs. dull), and Alive (vs. mechanistic). In validation studies, PI-99 subscales were internally reliable (mean α = .86); stable across time (e.g., mean 19-month test-retest correlation for the Big Three was r (398) = .77); highly correlated with many behavioral patterns and wellbeing outcomes theoretically influenced by primals; and performed better than Big Five personality traits when predicting important variables like interpersonal trust and life satisfaction. This chapter will show how the PI-99 builds on a history of measuring similar beliefs, suggest ways to improve the PI-99, and make recommendations for those seeking to use the PI-99 in their research.
The Video Game Demand Scale (VGDS) is a 26-item, five-factor scale designed to assess the cognitive, emotional, physical, and social demands experienced by video game players. Given the international relevance of video games, cross-cultural research focusing on gamers beyond the US community holds promise to substantiate and refine extant approaches. The current study introduces a German-language VGDS, which was tested for measurement invariance with respect to the original US scale as well as predictive, convergent, and concurrent validity (replicating the original VGDS validity tests). Results revealed configural and partial metric measurement invariance when compared with data from the original scale. Validity tests between the German-language VGDS and common measures of task load, entertainment, need satisfaction, and game ratings largely replicated original results. Overall, we conclude that the VGDS is a reliable, valid, and useful contribution to media psychological game research and suggest areas of future work for which an interactivity-as-demand focus might benefit.
Primal world beliefs–or primals–are a category of beliefs about the overall character of the world that inform individual differences in cognition, affect, and behavior. In a recent comprehensive effort, Clifton et al. (2019) cataloged 26 pervasive primals and developed the Primals Inventory (PI-99) to measure them. In this study (N = 592), we describe the adaptation and initial validation of the German Primals Inventory (PI-66-G), an instrument to measure primals in German-speaking countries. The PI-66-G's first-order structure was supported by exploratory factor analyses and the resulting scales demonstrated good reliability (median α = 0.81). Based on the PI-66-G, we extend Clifton et al.' (2019) work by modeling the primals' hierarchical structure: Higher-order factor analyses reproduced their three-level model including one primary primal (Good), the three original secondary primals (Safe, Enticing, Alive), and three additional secondary primals (Empowering, Communal, Fluid). In line with the previous findings, the PI-66-G's primals were differentially (but mainly positively) correlated with the Big Five and life satisfaction. The results suggest that primals can generally be organized in a hierarchical model, but that the current model cannot properly describe every primal. Based on our findings, we discuss three hypotheses that should be evaluated in future research.
Scale builders strive to maximize dual priorities: validity and reliability. While the literature is full of tips for increasing one, the other, or both simultaneously, how to navigate tensions between them is less clear. Confusion shrouds the nature, prevalence, and practical implications of trade-offs between validity and reliability-formerly called paradoxes. This confusion results in most trade-offs being resolved de facto at validity's expense despite validity being de jure the higher priority. Decades-long battles against clear measurement malpractice persist because unspecified trade-offs render scale-building decisions favoring validity perennially unattractive to scale builders. In light of this confusion, the goal of this article is to make plain that the source of validity versus reliability trade-offs is systematic error that contributes to item communality. Moreover, straightforward, nontrivial trade-offs pervade the scale-building process. This article highlights common trade-offs in 6 contexts: item content, item construction, item difficulty, item scoring, item order, and item analysis. I end with 5 recommendations for managing trade-offs and out 7 "dirty tricks" often used to exploit them when nobody's looking. In short, reviewers should require scale builders to declare how validity and reliability will be prioritized and penalize those who resolve trade-offs in goal-inconsistent ways. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2019 APA, all rights reserved).
Beck’s insight—that beliefs about one’s self, future, and environment shape behavior—transformed depression treatment. Yet environment beliefs remain relatively understudied. We introduce a set of environment beliefs— primal world beliefs or primals —that concern the world’s overall character (e.g., the world is interesting, the world is dangerous ). To create a measure, we systematically identified candidate primals (e.g., analyzing tweets, historical texts, etc.); conducted exploratory factor analysis ( N = 930) and two confirmatory factor analyses ( N = 524; N = 529); examined sequence effects ( N = 219) and concurrent validity ( N = 122); and conducted test-retests over 2 weeks ( n = 122), 9 months ( n = 134), and 19 months (n = 398). The resulting 99-item Primals Inventory (PI-99) measures 26 primals with three overarching beliefs— Safe, Enticing , and Alive (mean α = .93)—that typically explain ∼55% of the common variance. These beliefs were normally distributed; stable (2 weeks, 9 months, and 19 month test-retest results averaged .88, .75, and .77, respectively); strongly correlated with many personality and wellbeing variables (e.g., Safe and optimism, r = .61; Enticing and depression, r = −.52; Alive and meaning, r = .54); and explained more variance in life satisfaction, transcendent experience, trust, and gratitude than the BIG 5 (3%, 3%, 6%, and 12% more variance, respectively). In sum, the PI-99 showed strong psychometric characteristics, primals plausibly shape many personality and wellbeing variables, and a broad research effort examining these relationships is warranted.
Cross-cultural measurement invariance of the Revised Child Anxiety and Depression Scale across eleven world-wide societies – ERRATUM - Volume 26 Issue 4 - D. Stevanovic, Z. Bagheri, O. Atilola, P. Vostanis, D. Stupar, P. Moreira, T. Franic, N. Davidovic, R. Knez, A. Nikšić, K. Dodig-Ćurković, M. Avicenna, I. Multazam Noor, L. Nussbaum, A. Deljkovic, A. Aziz Thabet, P. Petrova, D. Ubalde, L. A. Monteiro, R. Ribas
Background: Psychometrics has a very important role and with the increase in the number of cross-cultural
research projects, there is need to adapt the scales to measure the health status. Objective: It was aimed to
describe the validation process comprehensively based on recent practices and to overview a practical guideline
of the validation study. Materials and Methods: Search was done in PubMed, PubMed Central, and Google
Scholar with searching keywords ranging date from January 2000 to December 2015. Finally, 78 articles were
selected for review and thorough methodological review was done in accordance with the review objectives.
Result: Review revealed that cultural adaptation followed similar steps with few variations. There was huge
variation in study design, sampling technique, and sample size. Cronbach’s alpha and test-retest reliability
were mostly used forms of reliability with variations in assessment of validity. Exploratory factor analysis was
used more for statistical analysis and followed similar criteria with few variations. Conclusion: Cross-cultural
measurement of health outcomes is really an important and challenging issue that needs elaborative guideline
to take appropriate steps to solve problems.
In a recent seminal article, Lilienfeld (2012) argued that psychological science is experiencing a public perception problem that has been caused by both public misconceptions about psychology, as well as the psychological science community's failure to distinguish itself from pop psychology and questionable therapeutic practices. Lilienfeld's analysis is an important and cogent synopsis of external problems that have limited psychological science's penetration into public knowledge. The current article expands upon this by examining internal problems, or problems within psychological science that have potentially limited its impact with policymakers, other scientists, and the public. These problems range from the replication crisis and defensive reactions to it, overuse of politicized policy statements by professional advocacy groups such as the American Psychological Association (APA), and continued overreliance on mechanistic models of human behavior. It is concluded that considerable problems arise from psychological science's tendency to overcommunicate mechanistic concepts based on weak and often unreplicated (or unreplicable) data that do not resonate with the everyday experiences of the general public or the rigor of other scholarly fields. It is argued that a way forward can be seen by, on one hand, improving the rigor and transparency of psychological science, and making theoretical innovations that better acknowledge the complexities of the human experience. (PsycINFO Database Record
The adaptation of psychological instruments is a complex process that requires a high methodological rigor. Because there is no consensus in the literature about its steps, this article discuss some essential aspects regarding the cross-cultural adaptation of psychological instruments and proposes guidelines to the researchers about the different steps of this process. Some considerations regarding the validation of the adapted instrument are also presented. In this stage, we discuss some aspects regarding the factorial structure of the instrument, which might be evaluated through statistical procedures, such as exploratory and confi rmatory factor analysis. More than that, the authors provide some guidelines to the validation of psychological instruments in different cultures.
Research on lower organisms by H. S. Jennings and Jacques Loeb, together with a positivistic approach to a philosophy of science, contributed to early efforts to explain behavior as a subject matter in its own right rather than as the effect of internal processes, mental or neural. The experimental analysis of behavior was an example of such a program. Psychology has remained, however, primarily a search for internal determiners. Three obstacles in its path as a science of behavior—humanistic psychology, the helping professions, and cognitive psychology—seem to explain why. Some of their unfortunate effects upon psychology as a science and as the basis of a technology are reviewed. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
A worldview (or "world view") is a set of assumptions about physical and social reality that may have powerful effects on cognition and behavior. Lacking a comprehensive model or formal theory up to now, the construct has been underused. This article advances theory by addressing these gaps. Worldview is defined. Major approaches to worldview are critically reviewed. Lines of evidence are described regarding worldview as a justifiable construct in psychology. Worldviews are distinguished from schemas. A collated model of a worldview's component dimensions is described. An integrated theory of worldview function is outlined, relating worldview to personality traits, motivation, affect, cognition, behavior, and culture. A worldview research agenda is outlined for personality and social psychology (including positive and peace psychology). (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
It is a common practice to export instruments developed in one culture to another. Little is known about the consequences of making inappropriate comparisons in cross-cultural research. Several studies were conducted to fill in this gap. Study 1 examined the impact of lacking factor loading invariance on regression slope comparisons. When factor loadings of a predictor are higher in the reference group (e.g., United States), for which the scale was developed, than in the focal group (e.g., China), into which the scale was imported, the predictive relationship (e.g., self-esteem predicting life satisfaction) is artificially stronger in the reference group but weaker in the focal group, creating a bogus interaction effect of predictor by group (e.g., self-esteem by culture); the opposite pattern is found when the reference group has higher loadings in an outcome variable. Studies 2 and 3 examined the impact of lacking loading and intercept (i.e., point of origin) invariance on factor means, respectively. When the reference group has higher loadings or intercepts, the mean is overestimated in that group but underestimated in the focal group, resulting in a pseudo group difference.
The authors investigated cross-cultural replicability of the five-factor model (FFM) of personality as represented by the revised NEO Personality Inventory (NEO-PI-R; P. T. Costa & R. R. McCrae, 1992) in a sample of 423 Dutch psychiatric patients. Also, NEO-PI-R domain scales were compared with the Personality Psychopathology Five (PSY-5; A. R. Harkness & J. L. McNulty, 1994) scales of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2 (J. N. Butcher, W. G. Dahlstrom, J. R. Graham, A. Tellegen, & B. Kaemmer, 2002). Principal-components analysis with procrustean rotation confirmed the hypothesized structural similarity of the present sample with the U.S. normative factor scores. All of the hypothesized relations between NEO-PI-R and PSY-5 scales were confirmed. The results provide evidence for cross-cultural replicability of the FFM and for validity of the NEO-PI-R and PSY-5 constructs in the psychological assessment of psychiatric patients.
The methods section of a research paper provides the information by which a study's validity is judged. Therefore, it requires a clear and precise description of how an experiment was done, and the rationale for why specific experimental procedures were chosen. The methods section should describe what was done to answer the research question, describe how it was done, justify the experimental design, and explain how the results were analyzed. Scientific writing is direct and orderly. Therefore, the methods section structure should: describe the materials used in the study, explain how the materials were prepared for the study, describe the research protocol, explain how measurements were made and what calculations were performed, and state which statistical tests were done to analyze the data. Once all elements of the methods section are written, subsequent drafts should focus on how to present those elements as clearly and logically as possibly. The description of preparations, measurements, and the protocol should be organized chronologically. For clarity, when a large amount of detail must be presented, information should be presented in sub-sections according to topic. Material in each section should be organized by topic from most to least important.
A review of articles in Psychological Assessment reveals that many researchers develop instruments without the benefit of consultation with members of the target population. To the extent that researchers do consult the target population, most fail to bring consultation in early enough to inform the identification and specification of key constructs. Moreover, this consultation typically takes the form of one-to-one interviews. The authors' goal in this article was to elaborate on the importance of population consultation as part of content validation and to critically evaluate the potential of one method of consultation, focus groups, to inform multiple stages of instrument development. The authors suggest that this method holds promise for enhancing the content validity of instruments and, ultimately, the validity of research findings.
This paper is a report of a study designed to: (i) describe issues and techniques of translation of standard measures for use in international research; (ii) identify a user-friendly and valid translation method when researchers have limited resources during translation procedure; and (iii) discuss translation issues using data from a pilot study as an example.
The process of translation is an important part of cross-cultural studies. Cross-cultural researchers are often confronted by the need to translate scales from one language to another and to do this with limited resources.
The lessons learned from our experience in a pilot study are presented to underline the importance of using appropriate translation procedures. The issues of the back-translation method are discussed to identify strategies to ensure success when translating measures.
A combined technique is an appropriate method to maintain the content equivalences between the original and translated instruments in international research. There are several possible combinations of translation techniques. However, there is no gold standard of translation techniques because the research environment (e.g. accessibility and availability of bilingual people) and the research questions are different.
It is important to use appropriate translation procedures and to employ a combined translation technique based on the research environment and questions.
The importance of intellectual talent to achievement in all professional domains is well established, but less is known about other individual differences that predict success. The authors tested the importance of 1 noncognitive trait: grit. Defined as perseverance and passion for long-term goals, grit accounted for an average of 4% of the variance in success outcomes, including educational attainment among 2 samples of adults (N = 1,545 and N = 690), grade point average among Ivy League undergraduates (N = 138), retention in 2 classes of United States Military Academy, West Point, cadets (N = 1,218 and N = 1,308), and ranking in the National Spelling Bee (N = 175). Grit did not relate positively to IQ but was highly correlated with Big Five Conscientiousness. Grit nonetheless demonstrated incremental predictive validity of success measures over and beyond IQ and conscientiousness. Collectively, these findings suggest that the achievement of difficult goals entails not only talent but also the sustained and focused application of talent over time.
Many areas of psychological science rely heavily on theoretical constructs, such as personality traits, attitudes, and emotions, and many of these measured constructs are defined by a continuum that represents the different degrees of the attribute. However, these continua are not usually considered by psychologists during the process of scale development and validation. Unfortunately, this can lead to numerous scientific problems, such as incomplete measurement of the construct, difficulties in distinguishing between constructs, and compromised evidence for validity. The purpose of the current article is to propose an approach for carefully considering these issues in psychological measurement. This approach, which we term continuum specification, is a two-stage process in which the researcher defines and then properly operationalizes the target continuum. Defining the continuum involves specifying its polarity (i.e., the meaning of its poles, or ends) and the nature of its gradations (i.e., the quality that separates high from low scores). Operationalizing the continuum means using this definition to develop a measure that (a) sufficiently captures the entire continuum, (b) has appropriate response options, (c) uses correct procedures for assessing dimensionality, and (d) accounts for the underlying response process. These issues have significant implications for psychological measurement.
This article reports the development and validation of a scale to measure global life satisfaction, the Satisfaction With Life Scale (SWLS). Among the various components of subjective well-being, the SWLS is narrowly focused to assess global life satisfaction and does not tap related constructs such as positive affect or loneliness. The SWLS is shown to have favorable psychometric properties, including high internal consistency and high temporal reliability. Scores on the SWLS correlate moderately to highly with other measures of subjective well-being, and correlate predictably with specific personality characteristics. It is noted that the SWLS is suited for use with different age groups, and other potential uses of the scale are discussed.
The design and evaluation of questionnaires—and of other written and oral materials—is a challenging endeavor, fraught with potential pitfalls. Cognitive Interviewing: A Tool for Improving Questionnaire Design describes a means of systematically developing survey questions through investigations that intensively probe the thought processes of individuals who are presented with those inquiries. The work provides general guidance about questionnaire design, development, and pre-testing sequence, with an emphasis on the cognitive interview. In particular, the book gives detailed instructions about the use of verbal probing techniques, and how one can elicit additional information from subjects about their thinking and about the manner in which they react to tested questions. These tools help researchers discover how well their questions are working, where they are failing, and determine what they can do to rectify the wide variety of problems that may surface while working with questionnaires.
In view of the medial diglossia which determines language use in German-speaking Switzerland, the changes presently emerging in this dialect area are of particular interest. Will the use of the speaker's own local dialect with people speaking a different Swiss German dialect lead to convergence of dialects? And will the omnipresent standard German variety lead to convergence with the other German-speaking countries? This study reports on ‘natural’ changes in the old ‘base dialects’ which tend to lead to convergence within German-speaking Switzerland. In a few cases they also lead to divergence from standard German. Furthermore, the use of variants confined to a small area decreases, a process leading to larger dialect areas in the end. On the level of the lexicon there are clear signs of convergence with standard German. Moreover, when inexperienced speakers ‘translate’ a text written in standard German into the dialect, as is often the case in public speech, the influence of the standard language is undeniable. However, the dialect changes found in the data are not to the extent that the origin of young speakers cannot be localised any longer.
Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) refers to a popular therapeutic approach that has been applied to a variety of problems. The goal of this review was to provide a comprehensive survey of meta-analyses examining the efficacy of CBT. We identified 269 meta-analytic studies and reviewed of those a representative sample of 106 meta-analyses examining CBT for the following problems: substance use disorder, schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders, depression and dysthymia, bipolar disorder, anxiety disorders, somatoform disorders, eating disorders, insomnia, personality disorders, anger and aggression, criminal behaviors, general stress, distress due to general medical conditions, chronic pain and fatigue, distress related to pregnancy complications and female hormonal conditions. Additional meta-analytic reviews examined the efficacy of CBT for various problems in children and elderly adults. The strongest support exists for CBT of anxiety disorders, somatoform disorders, bulimia, anger control problems, and general stress. Eleven studies compared response rates between CBT and other treatments or control conditions. CBT showed higher response rates than the comparison conditions in 7 of these reviews and only one review reported that CBT had lower response rates than comparison treatments. In general, the evidence-base of CBT is very strong. However, additional research is needed to examine the efficacy of CBT for randomized-controlled studies. Moreover, except for children and elderly populations, no meta-analytic studies of CBT have been reported on specific subgroups, such as ethnic minorities and low income samples.
We should admit that much of what is studied in psychology is not science. The biological aspect of psychology is considered science, but the sociological aspect is not science. Following Windelband's proposed entirely separate disciplines, a nomothetic (seeking general laws) and an ideographic (seeking to understand some particular event) discipline, it is concluded that the knowledge of psychology must be classified into the two groups, nomothetic and ideographic. The former is scientific. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
Using recent research, I argue that beliefs lie at the heart of personality and adaptive functioning and that they give us unique insight into how personality and functioning can be changed. I focus on two classes of beliefs - beliefs about the malleability of self-attributes and expectations of social acceptance versus rejection - and show how modest interventions have brought about important real-world changes. I conclude by suggesting that beliefs are central to the way in which people package their experiences and carry them forward, and that beliefs should play a more central role in the study of personality.
Behavioral scientists routinely publish broad claims about human psychology and behavior in the world's top journals based on samples drawn entirely from Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic (WEIRD) societies. Researchers - often implicitly - assume that either there is little variation across human populations, or that these "standard subjects" are as representative of the species as any other population. Are these assumptions justified? Here, our review of the comparative database from across the behavioral sciences suggests both that there is substantial variability in experimental results across populations and that WEIRD subjects are particularly unusual compared with the rest of the species - frequent outliers. The domains reviewed include visual perception, fairness, cooperation, spatial reasoning, categorization and inferential induction, moral reasoning, reasoning styles, self-concepts and related motivations, and the heritability of IQ. The findings suggest that members of WEIRD societies, including young children, are among the least representative populations one could find for generalizing about humans. Many of these findings involve domains that are associated with fundamental aspects of psychology, motivation, and behavior - hence, there are no obvious a priori grounds for claiming that a particular behavioral phenomenon is universal based on sampling from a single subpopulation. Overall, these empirical patterns suggests that we need to be less cavalier in addressing questions of human nature on the basis of data drawn from this particularly thin, and rather unusual, slice of humanity. We close by proposing ways to structurally re-organize the behavioral sciences to best tackle these challenges.
With the increase in the number of multinational and multicultural research projects, the need to adapt health status measures for use in other than the source language has also grown rapidly. 1,4,27 Most questionnaires were developed in English-speaking countries, 11 but even within these countries, researchers must consider immigrant populations in studies of health, especially when their exclusion could lead to a systematic bias in studies of health care utilization or quality of life. 9,11 The cross-cultural adaptation of a health status selfadministered questionnaire for use in a new country, culture, and/or language necessitates use of a unique method, to reach equivalence between the original source and target versions of the questionnaire. It is now recognized that if measures are to be used across cultures, the items must not only be translated well linguistically, but also must be adapted culturally to maintain the content validity of the instrument at a conceptual level across different cultures. 6,11‐13,15,24 Attention to this level of detail allows increased confidence that the impact of a disease or its treatment is described in a similar manner in multinational trials or outcome evaluations. The term “cross-cultural adaptation” is used to encompass a process that looks at both language (translation) and cultural adaptation issues in the process of preparing a questionnaire for use in another setting. Cross-cultural adaptations should be considered for several different scenarios. In some cases, this is more obvious than in others. Guillemin et al 11 suggest five different examples of when attention should be paid to this adaptation by comparing the target (where it is going to be used) and source (where it was developed) language and culture. The first scenario is that it is to be used in the same language and culture in which it was developed. No adaptation is necessary. The last scenario is the opposite extreme, the application of a questionnaire in a different culture, language and country—moving the Short Form 36-item questionnaire from the United States (source) to Japan (target) 7 which would necessitate translation and cultural adaptation. The other scenarios are summarized in Table 1 and reflect situations when some translation and/or adaptation is needed. The guidelines described in this document are based on a review of cross-cultural adaptation in the medical, sociological, and psychological literature. This review led to the description of a thorough adaptation process designed to maximize the attainment of semantic, idiomatic, experiential, and conceptual equivalence between the source and target questionnaires. 13 . Further experience in cross-cultural adaptation of generic and diseasespecific instruments and alternative strategies driven by different research groups 18 have led to some refinements
The purpose of this paper is to discuss problems that occur in questionnaire responses and how cognitive interviewing can be used to identify problematic questions prior to using the questionnaire in the field.
Questionnaire design involves developing wording that is clear, unambiguous and permits respondents successfully to answer the question that is asked. However, a number of problems in relation to respondents' understanding and successfully completing questionnaires have been identified. Cognitive interviewing, an amalgamation of cognitive psychology and survey methodology, has been developed to identify problematic questions that may elicit response error. The overall aim is to use cognitive theory to understand how respondents perceive and interpret questions and to identify potential problems that may arise in prospective survey questionnaires.
A literature review is used to examine the process of questionnaire design and how cognitive interviewing can be used to reduce sampling error and increase questionnaire response rates.
Cognitive interviewing involves interviewers asking survey respondents to think out loud as they go through a survey questionnaire and tell them everything they are thinking. This allows understanding of the questionnaire from the respondents' perspective rather than that of the researchers. Cognitive interviews have been used in a number of areas in health care research to pretest and validate questionnaires and to ensure high response rates. Interviewing has been found to be highly effective in developing questionnaires for age specific groups (children and adolescents) and in ascertaining respondents' understanding in health surveys prior to distribution. However, cognitive interviews have been criticized for being overly subjective and artificial.
Cognitive interviews are a positive addition to current methods of pretesting questionnaires prior to distribution to the sample. They are most valuable in pretesting questions that are complex, where questions are sensitive and intrusive and for specific groups for whom questionnaire completion may pose particular difficulties.
This article puts forward the case that survey questionnaires, which are a type of measuring instrument, can and should be tested to ensure they meet their purpose. Traditionally survey researchers have been pre-occupied with 'standardising' data collection instruments and procedures such as question wording and have assumed that experience in questionnaire design, coupled with pilot testing of questionnaires, will then ensure valid and reliable results. However, implicit in the notion of standardisation are the assumptions that respondents are able to understand the questions being asked, that questions are understood in the same way by all respondents, and that respondents are willing and able to answer such questions. The development of cognitive question testing methods has provided social researchers with a number of theories and tools to test these assumptions, and to develop better survey instruments and questionnaires. This paper describes some of these theories and tools, and argues that cognitive testing should be a standard part of the development process of any survey instrument.
Handbook of positive psychology assessment
- Gander
Gander (Eds.), Handbook of positive psychology assessment. European Association of
Psychological Assessment.
Intonation systems: A survey of twenty languages
- D Gibbon
Gibbon, D. (1998). Intonation in German. In D. Hirst & A. Di Cristo (Eds.), Intonation systems:
A survey of twenty languages (pp. 78-95). Cambridge University Press.
Fundamentals of survey research methodology
- P Glasgow
Glasgow, P. (2005). Fundamentals of survey research methodology. MITRE, retrieved from
https://www.mitre.org/sites/default/files/pdf/05_0638.pdf
How to translate the MFQ. YourMorals Blog
- J Haidt
Haidt, J. (2010). How to translate the MFQ. YourMorals Blog. Retrieved from
http://www.yourmorals.org/blog/2010/01/how-to-translate-the-mfq/