Magali and jean-gabriel have been asked to design a study investigating happiness across the lifespan. they decide their study will involve going to the mall and asking people of a variety of ages if they are happy or unhappy. what is the most serious flaw of this design? question 8 options:

The most serious flaw of this design, which investigates happiness across the lifespan and involves going to the mall and asking people of a variety of ages if they are happy or unhappy, is that they have not defined happiness or how it will be measured. Happiness is a subjective thing, and people will maybe feel sad despite the fact that everything is all right.  

The flaw of this design is the measurement of happiness itself. They need to define happiness and decide the measurement of it.

EXPLANATION

Magali and Jean-Gabriel should define happiness itself. After defining happiness, then they have to make the measurement of happiness using the definition that they had chosen for their research. Going around the mall and asking whether people are happy and unhappy is too subjective for research.

Psychological measurement is a developed procedure to measure people’s psychological characteristics, personality, and even intelligence. The presence of psychological characteristics of a subject can be measured by applying a standardized test. A test should meet the conditions of being reliable and valid.

A test can be called valid if it measures what it is supposed to measure. There are many qualities and psychological characteristics that are interesting to measure, but psychologists have a hard time measuring it. To create a valid and reliable psychological measurement, then the researcher should give the psychological characteristics a qualified definition, and that break that definition into items for psychological measurement. The definition and theory of psychological characteristics are the keys to make a psychological measurement.

To be reliable, a psychological measurement should have a consistent result over time. A test can be given to the same people at a different time. If the test produces the same result, in this case, consistent, then the test can be called reliable. The test must be free from subjective considerations.

To be meaningful, the result of a test must be compared to the standardized result. The standardized result refers to a comparison group that has similar characteristics. This is to know if the result is higher or lower than the standardized ones.

LEARN MORE

If you’re interested in learning more about this topic, we recommend you to also take a look at the following questions:

Happiness study:

Deception in psychological research:

KEYWORD: psychological measurement, happiness, study

Subject: Social Studies

Class: 10-12

Subchapter: Psychological measurement