STC 262 Study Guide - Quiz Guide: Nonprobability Sampling, Confidence Interval, Sampling Error

• School: Miami University
• Department: Strategic Communication
• Course: STC 262
• Professor: Sasha

Document Summary

Define the term sampling and explain why we use samples instead of populations. Sampling is the term used to refer to selecting people or units for inclusion in a research study. Researchers use samples instead of populations because it is expensive and takes a lot of time to include all members of the population. Identifying the theoretical population that the researcher would like to generalize the results of the study to and then identifying the actual study population that includes participants that the researcher could realistically contact. Identifying all members of that group and determining how each one could be contacted for inclusion in the study. Identifying the method that will be used to select members of the accessible population for inclusion in the sample that is contacted for the study. The central limits theorem states that the mean of the scores obtained from the probability sample will be equal to the mean of the scores obtained from the population.