Discussion Question:
Suppose a friend was planning to use simple random sampling in a research project from which he or she wants to generalize to all students on a campus. Would you recommend drawing names from a hat or using a table of random numbers? Why?
My Answer:
I believe that the friend would want to use a table of random numbers rather than draw names from a hat. Because this would be a group in a possibly larger capacity on a campus – it is nice to be organized and detailed.
As stated in the book, “it should become attached to that person’s identifying information as a column in a spreadsheet of names or as a designated number name for each member of the population. Each number should contain the same number of digits,” (Patten and Newhart, 2017). It is more thought out and this way there are no complications.
Whereas with drawing names from a hat there could be complications with someone else having the same name. There could also be more questions added to this if the friend were to do it this way. Do the people have to be present? “A random sample can be as simple and low-tech as putting names on slips of paper, and then drawing them from a hat,” (Patten and Newhart, 2017). “Random samples are subject to error,” (Patten and Newhart, 2017).
In conclusion, I believe using Random numbers allows the individual to be more organized on a spreadsheet than pulling names from a hat. Random numbers allows the individual to have an answer at the end of the research. They are then able to log everything in online or in a book and have the answer from there based on their random number selection.
Reference:
Patten, M. L., & Newhart, M. (2017). Understanding Research Methods: An Overview of the Essentials (10th ed.). Routledge.
You brought up a very valid point that I had not considered, but agree with your logic completely. Using the spreadsheet method of assigning a random number to all the participants would, indeed, alleviate certain problems that may arise from drawing names from a hat. It brought to my mind something from my youth (in a private school) that would definitely have been a problem with the hat method. It might seem unbelievable, but there were two Chris Hills in my class for a couple of years. One was Christian Hill, and one was Christopher Hill. That coupled with my first name made it confusing enough as we all went by Chris, but the fact that both of theses Chris’ had the same last name. Though we were friends in school, we made it a point not to sit close to each other in class in case the teacher called upon us to give an oral response to a question, or read a passage from the class text. Sitting apart gave us the advantage of at least cuing on the teacher’s body language to know which Chris she was talking to. Anyway, that could make for a real mess with drawing names from a hat, especially if you drew both Chris Hills. Your ability to organize all of your collected data on a spreadsheet with respect to the numbered participant is by far the best way to go. I appreciate your response as it gave me something to think about.
The idea of using a spreadsheet is something that sounds a lot simpler when it comes to organizational skills. Of course, with the increased number of participants you run into more challenges to making it equal for everyone. Numbers that are in place of the person helps structure the sample in a better way. This is a good example of how to properly collect the data you are looking for. I believe if you were to try to accomplish one. You would be highly successful with it. Thank you for the post it was interesting to think about.