Question

Research Methods

Consider the possibility that we wanted to survey this class on the legalization of marijuana as being representative of the college student population. Have students identify possible representative problems such as the class being criminal justice students and their opinions may be different than the college population as a whole. Additionally, we want to survey random college students as being representative of the community at large in regard to raising the legal drinking age to 24. What biases or representative problems would exist?

Answer 1

Thank yo for the questions.

Now, we have two surveys to conduct:

1) on the legalization of marijuana, we wanted to survey this class, the class being criminal justice students, as being representative of the college student population

2) on raising the legal drinking age to 24, we want to survey random college students as being representative of the community at large

What biases or representative problems would exist?

Now in the both the surveys, we have one common issue, that is, the sample space we intend to survey is not the sample space we are actually surveying. So here are the biases or representative problems that we would see in each of the surveys:

1) In the legalize marijuana survey, the criminal justice students may have different inclinations depending on what kind of sources they follow. For instance their could be students who believe that marijuana, based on its history in America, was illegalized for stopping illegal immigrants from Mexico to enter America and to target people of certain races, such as African Americans, that were known to use marijuana on a regular bases, this can be understood by looking at the advertising campaigns that were run at the time by the government that can now be clearly seen as propaganda with racist motives. One could also look at the sponsorship provided by the prison industries to the illegalization agenda and the lobby against the medical marijuana by pharmaceutical companies. Then their could be those students who brought into the propaganda and the lies and did not have the chance to look at the situation more thoroughly/objectively. I believe the biases in the class would be as common as in any sample space that we select and the results of the survey would be very random and unpredictable as the inclination of students depends on their own interests and awareness of the topic.

2) On raising the legal drinking age to 24, the survey participants being students, who may themselves be under the age of 24, may be more inclined towards going against the agenda of the survey as alcohol is a socially acceptable means of escaping reality and is widely available and used. However, looking at the current trend of there being a legal age for drinking, their are restaurants, clubs, and pubs that have to follow these restrictions and their are underage people who manage to get inside these restaurants/clubs/pubs despite the restrictions and get drunk. So there would be a small fraction of the survey participants who would not care what the outcome of the survey is or whether it is adopted in the law of the land. Now, if the survey would have been conducted in the community at large, there would have been concerned parents and certain special interest groups who would have voiced their favor for raising the legal drinking age and so the actual results of the survey would not represent the opinion of these concerned parents and these special interest groups.

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