1 / 12

Content Coding

Content Coding . Another way to “create” new measures. What is source material to code?. Could be past: Archival, Meta-analysis Could be present: Observational, Survey, Experiment Could any aspect of Person or Situation Affect, Behavior, Cognition, Physiology/Biology

raymondallen
Download Presentation

Content Coding

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript

  1. Content Coding Another way to “create” new measures

  2. What is source material to code? • Could be past: • Archival, Meta-analysis • Could be present: • Observational, Survey, Experiment • Could any aspect of Person or Situation • Affect, Behavior, Cognition, Physiology/Biology • Intrapersonal, Interpersonal, Intergroup, Societal

  3. What to do after you find it? • Define Variables • Operationalize Variables • Create Coding Book • Train Coders • Pilot Test • Code the Material • Statistically Analyze Codings • Revise Coding or Coders (if necessary)

  4. (1) Define Variables • See prior material in class about Research Topics, Questions, Hypotheses Also… • Must have clear definition, be documented, explicit, and open to scrutiny • Must identify your inclusion and exclusion criteria • This is partly an a priori determination of what to investigate • This is partly an on-going dynamic process where you review the literature and decide what to investigate • This is partly an ad-hoc statement or summary of what you investigated

  5. (2) Operationalize Variables • See prior material in class about translating hypotheses into measures

  6. (3) Create Coding Book • Coding Book is a blue-print that identifies all variables and how to transform into quantitative analysis • What to include… (some options) • All your variables • Research respondents – sample size, age, sex, location, and all other demographic characteristics, etc. • Source information - publication form, date of publication, institution, country of publication, etc. • Historical and Contextual information – time frame, historical events that occurred during the time frame, linguistic or culture influences, etc. IF coding for surveys/experiments… • Type of IV - description, theory, type, levels, etc. • Type of DV - description, theory, type, levels, etc. • Aspects of Procedures – type, level, design • Aspects of Hypothesis/Theory

  7. (4) Train Coders • Identify number • If subjective coding, need two or more, and ideally three to five. • If objective, then one coder is sufficient • Meeting(s) • Train on coding manual • Resolve comprehension issues, ambiguity issues

  8. (5) Pilot Test • What to test? • Maybe includes small portion of actual material to be coded • Maybe includes similar, but not exact, material to be coded • Practice to produce consistency • Did the coder code the same way from the first entry to the last entry? • Might become more proficient and knowledgeable at end so code differently than first entry • Is there a break in coding of days, week, months? • Possibly refine coding manual and procedures

  9. (6) Code the Material • Coding the entire range of source material • Possible interim meetings to compare/contrast and discuss problems

  10. (7) Statistically Analyze • See Spring Statistics class

  11. (8) Revise Coding or Coders • If statistical analysis shows inconsistencies… • If coding errors discovered after the fact… • If coding bias discovered after the fact… • If realize want to include more source material or more variables… …, then repeat steps 1-7 including new coding or new coders

  12. Advanced Sources • The Handbook of Research Methods in Social and Personality Psychology, Edited by Reis and Judd, has good chapters on content coding: Chapter 12 and Chapter 8

More Related