Question

introductory survey project - scheel - statistics - room 404

1. choose a main topic that your survey will be about.
2. create 3 questions that are related to your main topic. one question must be designed to elicit a quantitative (number) answer. the other two questions should elicit a qualitative answer (one should be a true/false, yes/no type question. the other should be an abcd multiple choice type question).
3. survey a minimum of 40 people. you may need to survey people outside this class. each person should respond to all 3 of your questions. record a tally sheet complete with names of those surveyed and their answers.
4. for the quantitative question, find the mean answer value. for the qualitative questions, find the percent of answers in each category.
5. display the data from the surveys graphically. use pie charts, bar graphs, dot plots, or any other graph type of your choice.
6. write a short summary paper of your results (approx. a page) as if you were writing an article for a newspaper or magazine, explaining your survey project. were your results surprising or expected? do you think your results would be representative of larger population groups? do you think your results would be different if you surveyed a different group of people? why or why not. in discussing the answers to these writing prompts, cite the statistics you calculated from step four.

Explanation:

Step1: Choose a main topic

Let's say the main topic is "Favorite Season".

Step2: Create 3 questions

• Quantitative question: "How many days in a month do you spend outdoors during your favorite season?".
• True - false/yes - no question: "Do you prefer cold - weather activities in your favorite season? (Yes/No)".
• Multiple - choice question: "Which activity do you like most in your favorite season? A. Hiking B. Swimming C. Skiing D. Picnicking".

Step3: Conduct the survey

Survey at least 40 people, record their names and answers on a tally sheet.

Step4: Analyze the data

• For the quantitative question, sum all the answers and divide by the number of respondents to find the mean. For example, if the sum of the days spent outdoors is 1200 and there are 40 respondents, the mean is $\frac{1200}{40}=30$ days.
• For the qualitative questions, count the number of responses in each category and calculate the percentage. For the yes/no question, if 25 people answer yes out of 40, the percentage of yes answers is $\frac{25}{40}\times100 = 62.5\%$. For the multiple - choice question, if 10 people choose A, 15 choose B, 8 choose C and 7 choose D, the percentages are $\frac{10}{40}\times100 = 25\%$ for A, $\frac{15}{40}\times100 = 37.5\%$ for B, $\frac{8}{40}\times100 = 20\%$ for C and $\frac{7}{40}\times100 = 17.5\%$ for D.

Step5: Display the data graphically

For the quantitative data, a bar graph can be used to show the mean value. For the qualitative data, a pie chart can be used to show the percentages in each category.

Step6: Write the summary paper

In the paper, explain the survey topic, the questions asked, the number of respondents. Discuss the results. If the mean number of days spent outdoors was 30, mention it. If the percentage of people who prefer cold - weather activities was 62.5%, include that. Analyze if the results were surprising (e.g., if a large percentage of people chose an unexpected activity in the multiple - choice question). Consider the representativeness of the sample. If the survey was done among students on a campus, it may not be representative of the whole population. Discuss if the results would be different with a different group, for example, if the survey was done in a different geographical area or among different age groups.

Answer:

The steps above show how to complete the survey project as required. The specific results will vary based on the actual survey data collected.