RESEARCH METHOD COHEN ok

THE ACCESS TO THE SAMPLE 109
data have been collected. For example, in a
secondary school where half of the students are
male and half are female, consider pupils’ responses
to the question ‘How far does your liking of the
form teacher affect your attitude to work’
Variable: How far does your liking of the form
teacher affect your attitude to school work
Very A Some- Quite A very
little little what a lot great
deal
Male 10 20 30 25 15
Female 50 80 30 25 15
Total 60 100 60 50 30
Let us say that we are interested in the attitudes
according to the gender of the respondents, as well
as overall. In this example one could surmise that
generally the results indicate that the liking of the
form teacher has only a small to moderate effect
on the students’ attitude to work. However, we
have to observe that twice as many girls as boys
are included in the sample, and this is an unfair
representation of the population of the school,
which comprises 50 per cent girls and 50 per cent
boys, i.e. girls are over-represented and boys are
under-represented. If one equalizes the two sets
of scores by gender to be closer to the school
population (either by doubling the number of boys
or halving the number of girls) then the results
look very different.
Variable: How far does your liking of the form
teacher affect your attitude to school work
Very A Some- Quite A very
little little what a lot great
deal
Male 20 40 60 50 30
Female 50 80 30 25 15
Total 70 120 90 75 45
In this latter case a much more positive picture is
painted, indicating that the students regard their
liking of the form teacher as a quite important
feature in their attitude to school work. Here
equalizing the sample to represent more fairly
the population by weighting yields a different
picture. Weighting the results is an important
consideration.
The access to the sample
Access is a key issue and is an early factor that must
be decided in research. Researchers will need to
ensure that access is not only permitted but also, in
fact, practicable. For example, if a researcher were
to conduct research into truancy and unauthorized
absence from school, and decided to interview
a sample of truants, the research might never
commence as the truants, by definition, would not
be present! Similarly access to sensitive areas might
be not only difficult but also problematical both
legally and administratively, for example, access
to child abuse victims, child abusers, disaffected
students, drug addicts, school refusers, bullies and
victims of bullying. In some sensitive areas access
to a sample might be denied by the potential
sample participants themselves, for example AIDS
counsellors might be so seriously distressed by their
work that they simply cannot face discussing with
aresearcherthesubjectmatteroftheirtraumatic
work; it is distressing enough to do the job without
living through it again with a researcher.
Access might also be denied by the potential
sample participants themselves for very practical
reasons, for example a doctor or a teacher
simply might not have the time to spend with
the researcher. Further, access might be denied
by people who have something to protect, for
example a school which has recently received
averypoorinspectionresultorpoorresultson
external examinations, or people who have made
an important discovery or a new invention and
who do not wish to disclose the secret of their
success; the trade in intellectual property has
rendered this a live issue for many researchers.
There are very many reasons that might prevent
access to the sample, and researchers cannot afford
to neglect this potential source of difficulty in
planning research.
In many cases access is guarded by ‘gatekeepers’
– people who can control researchers’ access to
those whom they really want to target. For school
staff this might be, for example, headteachers,
Chapter 4