An Experimental Test of the Impact of Varying Questionnaire Response Format on Prevalence Rates for Sexual Violence Victimization and Perpetration

Objective: This study examined the impact of a dichotomous versus scaled response format on prevalence rates of sexual violence perpetration and victimization, thus conceptually replicating Hamby et al., 2006 and extending those findings to the context of sexual violence. Methods: Two samples were recruited from Amazon Mechanical Turk and were randomly assigned to either a dichotomous or scaled response format of the same questionnaire. Sample 1 was used to examine perpetration and received a perpetration specific version of the Post-Refusal Sexual Persistence Scale (PRSPS). Sample 2 was used to examine victimization and received a victimization specific version of the PRSPS. Results: Men and women who received the scaled response format reported significantly more incidents of sexual perpetration, and for each type of tactic studied, on the order of 1.7-9x more frequently. The association between response format condition and prevalence rates of sexual violence victimization was significant only for men (23.0 vs 39.4%) and for the tactic of verbal coercion (30.1 vs 41.5%), with the scaled response format producing greater responding. Conclusions: The response format of sexual violence items can significantly alter prevalence rates of sexual violence perpetration, with scaled response formats producing greater endorsements than dichotomous formats. Response format also appears to impact prevalence rates of sexual violence victimization, particularly for men.

An Experimental Test of the Impact of Varying Questionnaire Response Format on Prevalence Rates for Sexual Violence Victimization and Perpetration

Objective: This study examined the impact of a dichotomous versus scaled response format on prevalence rates of sexual violence perpetration and victimization, thus conceptually replicating Hamby et al., 2006 and extending those findings to the context of sexual violence. Methods: Two samples were recruited from Amazon Mechanical Turk and were randomly assigned to either a dichotomous or scaled response format of the same questionnaire. Sample 1 was used to examine perpetration and received a perpetration specific version of the Post-Refusal Sexual Persistence Scale (PRSPS). Sample 2 was used to examine victimization and received a victimization specific version of the PRSPS. Results: Men and women who received the scaled response format reported significantly more incidents of sexual perpetration, and for each type of tactic studied, on the order of 1.7-9x more frequently. The association between response format condition and prevalence rates of sexual violence victimization was significant only for men (23.0 vs 39.4%) and for the tactic of verbal coercion (30.1 vs 41.5%), with the scaled response format producing greater responding. Conclusions: The response format of sexual violence items can significantly alter prevalence rates of sexual violence perpetration, with scaled response formats producing greater endorsements than dichotomous formats. Response format also appears to impact prevalence rates of sexual violence victimization, particularly for men.

Professional Knowledge and Self-Efficacy Expectations of Pre-Service Teachers Regarding Scientific Reasoning and Diagnostics

Understanding and knowledge of scientific reasoning skills is a key ability of pre-service teachers. In a written survey (open response format), biology and chemistry pre-service teachers (n = 51) from two German universities claimed central decisions or actions school students have to perform in scientific reasoning in the open inquiry instruction of an experiment. The participants’ answers were assessed in a quality content analysis using a rubric system generated from a theoretical background. Instruments in a closed response format were used to measure attitudes towards the importance of diagnostics in teacher training and the domain-specific expectations of self-efficacy. The pre-service teacher lacked pedagogical (didactics) content knowledge about potential student difficulties and also exhibited a low level of content methodological (procedural) knowledge. There was no correlation between the knowledge of student difficulties and the approach to experimenting with expectations of self-efficacy for diagnosing student abilities regarding scientific reasoning. Self-efficacy expectations concerning their own abilities to successfully cope with general and experimental diagnostic activities were significantly lower than the attitude towards the importance of diagnostics in teacher training. The results are discussed with regard to practical implications as they imply that scientific reasoning should be promoted in university courses, emphasising the importance of understanding the science-specific procedures (knowing how) and epistemic constructs in scientific reasoning (knowing why).

Validity of the ACTS intimate partner violence screen in antenatal care: a cross sectional study

Background Intimate partner violence (IPV) is a major public health problem with harmful consequences. In Australia, there is no national standard screening tool and screening practice is variable across states. The objectives of this study were to assess in the antenatal healthcare setting: i) the validity of a new IPV brief screening tool and ii) women’s preference for screening response format, screening frequency and comfort level. Methods One thousand sixty-seven antenatal patients in a major metropolitan Victorian hospital in Australia completed a paper-based, self-administered survey. The survey included four screening items about whether they were Afraid/Controlled/Threatened/Slapped or physically hurt (ACTS) by a partner or ex-partner in the last 12 months; and the Composite Abuse Scale (reference standard). The ACTS screen was presented firstly with a binary yes/no response format and then with a five-point ordinal frequency format from ‘never’ (0) to ‘very frequently’ (4). The main outcome measures were test statistics of the four-item ACTS screening tool (sensitivity, specificity, predictive values, and area under the curve) against the reference standard and women’s screening preferences. Results Twelve-month IPV prevalence varied depending on the ACTS response format with 8% (83) positive on ACTS yes/no format, 12.8% (133) positive on ACTS ordinal frequency format and 10.5% (108) on the reference Composite Abuse Scale. Overall, the ACTS screening tool demonstrated clinical utility for the ordinal frequency format (AUC, 0.80; 95% CI = 0.76 to 0.85) and the binary yes/no format (AUC, 0.74, 95% CI = 0.69 to 0.79). The frequency scale (66%) had greater sensitivity than the yes/no scale (51%). The positive and negative predictive values were 56 and 96% for the frequency scale and 68 and 95% for the yes/no scale. Specificity was high regardless of screening question response options. Half (53%) of the women categorised as abused preferred the yes/no scale. Around half of the women (48%, 472) thought health care providers should ask pregnant women about IPV at every visit. Conclusions The four-item ACTS tool (using the frequency scale and a cut-off of one on any item) is recommended for written self-administered screening of women to identify those experiencing IPV to enable first-line response and follow-up.

New insights on respondents’ recall ability and memory effects when repeatedly measuring political efficacy

Many study designs in social science research rely on repeated measurements implying that the same respondents are asked the same (or nearly the same) questions at least twice. An assumption made by such study designs is that respondents second answer does not depend on their first answer. However, if respondents recall their initial answer and base their second answer on it memory effects may affect the survey outcome. In this study, I investigate respondents’ recall ability and memory effects within the same survey and randomly assign respondents to a device type (PC or smartphone) and a response format (response scale or text field) for reporting their previous answer. While the results reveal no differences regarding device types, they reveal differences regarding response formats. Respondents’ recall ability is higher when they are provided with the response scale again than when they are only provided with a text field (without displaying the response scale again). The same finding applies to the size of estimated memory effects. This study provides evidence that the size of memory effects may have been overestimated in previous studies.

From Meditation to Bliss: Achieving the Heights of Progressive Spiritual Energy through Kirtan Singing in American Gaudiya Vaishnava Hinduism

Kirtan is a musical worship practice from India that involves the congregational performance of sacred chants and mantras in call-and-response format. The style of kirtan performed within Gaudiya Vaishnava Hinduism is an expression of Bhakti Yoga, “the yoga of love and devotion”, and focuses on creating a personal, playful, and emotionally intense connection between the worshipper and their god—specifically, through words and sounds whose vibration is believed to carry the literal presence of Krishna. Kirtan is one of many Indian genres that uses musical techniques to move participants through a progression of spiritual states from meditation to ecstasy. Kirtan-singing has become internationally popular in recent decades, largely thanks to the efforts of the Hare Krishna movement, which has led to extensive hybridization of musical styles and cultural approaches to kirtan adapted to the needs of a diasporic, globalized community of worshippers. This essay explores the practice of kirtan in the United States through interviews, fieldwork, and analysis of recordings made at several Krishna temples and festivals that demonstrate the musical techniques that can be spontaneously deployed in acts of collective worship in order to create intense feelings of deep, focused meditation and uninhibited, expressive bliss.

The effect of spatial distance between objects on categorization level

We show that spatial distance between two objects influences how people categorize these objects. We report three (two pre-registered) experiments that show that when objects are presented close together (proximal), they are more likely to be categorized in a superordinate category than when they are presented further apart (distant). In Experiments 1A and 1B, participants provided spontaneous category labels in an open response format. In Experiment 2, we asked participants to indicate their preference for either of two category labels. We found that when objects were close together, they were categorized more often into superordinate categories than when objects were far apart (Experiments 1A and 2). Our findings demonstrate that the categorization of objects is, in part, determined by where they are in relation to other objects.

Development and preliminary evaluation of a brief five-factor personality instrument

Instruments to measure personality traits in the five-factor model of personality are typically lengthy, which can hamper their use in studies with multiple measures. In this study we developed a brief five-factor instrument based on a bipolar statement response format and validated the instrument for use in the Singapore education context. The 20-item Brief Five-Factor Instrument (BFFI) comprises four items to measure each personality factor in the five-factor model. To evaluate the internal structure of the BFFI, students at two polytechnics in Singapore responded to the scale (Polytechnic A, n = 421; Polytechnic B, n = 271). Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were conducted to evaluate the factor structure of the measure. Results suggest that the BFFI has promise for use in the Singapore education context.