Guidelines for Preparing a Research Report

Assignment Task

This (online) study was conducted among the current first- (recruited on Sona) and second-year students (recruited via forum advert) and contained several different scales. All data collection took place on Qualtrics. On Keats you can find files that will help you navigate through this study and the data.

The Introduction and Methods section of the report will be provided to you (written by the module staff). Your task will be to write the Title, Abstract, Results and Discussion sections of the report.

Your task is to evaluate the factor structure, reliability, and validity of the new ‘Social Status’ scale that we discussed in the Seminars of Week 1 and 6 and Live Lectures in Week 2 and 7. We will use the term ‘Social Status’ to refer to two properties: real-world social status and online social status. Social status refers to the extent to which we feel that others respect us, admire us, and consider us to be important. Real-world social status refers to our social status (the amount of respect, admiration, importance we receive from others) within face-to-face settings and will likely be influenced by factors such as profession, lifestyle, social class. Whereas ‘Online social status’ refers to our social status on online platforms i.e., social media (Twitter, Instagram, Facebook etc.). This will likely be influenced by factors such as the amount and type of content we post online. Although real-world social status and online social status are probably positively correlated, it is possible for people to be low on real-world social status but high on online social status (e.g., a particularly shy individual who struggles to interact in real-world social settings but posts widely about important and appealing online content) or to be high in real-world social status but low on online social status (e.g., an individual with a well-respected profession and an interesting lifestyle but rarely posts on social media sites or has no social media accounts).

Besides the Social Status scale, you will find a number of other variables in the same dataset. You will need to identify variables that are directly relevant to the tests that you are asked to conduct (see further below). The full list of measures that we included is as follows:

1. Our Social Status scale (both a ‘real-world social status’ subscale and an ‘online social status’ subscale)
2. Status and Inclusion measure from Mahadevan, Gregg, Sedikides, & de Waal-Andrews (2016)
3. UCLA Loneliness scale (version 3) from Russell (1996)
4. Short Big-5 personality inventory (including all 5 subscales) from Gosling, Rentfrow, and Swann (2003)
5. Rosenberg self-esteem scale from Rosenberg (1965)
6. Bergen Social Media Addiction scale from Andreassen, Billieux, Griffiths, Kuss, Demetrovics, Mazzoni, and Pallesen (2016)

Excluded data

Following data collection, the following three exclusions were made to the dataset. Each should be outlined very briefly in your report:

1. The data for two participants was excluded as the participants did not provide full consent for their data to be included.
2. The data for 11 participants was excluded as they submitted incomplete datasets i.e., they started but did not finish the survey.

You need to complete the following analyses:

Evaluate the Factor Structure of the Scale

1. Use a confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to evaluate how well our two-factor model fits the data that has been collected. Use your prior knowledge of the items and subscales that we intended to create to define the two-factor measurement model. Consider if the results from the CFA match our expectations and intentions for the scale design.
2. After conducting the CFA, use an exploratory factor analysis (EFA) to evaluate the factor structure of our Social Status scale using exploratory methods. Use the approach outlined in the EFA practical. Consider what the results tell you, and whether some items need to be excluded based on the analysis. Then, if necessary, perform another EFA on the revised scale (e.g., after dropping some problematic items). Consider if the final scale appears to be measuring Global Social Status with subscales Real World Social Status and Online Social Status as intended. If not, what might the scale be measuring? Are there more appropriate labels for the subscales?

Evaluate the Reliability of the Scale

1. After establishing a satisfying factor structure, you need to assess the reliability of the corresponding scale and any subscales . You will examine the internal consistency using the ‘Cronbach’s alpha’ statistic. Discuss the results for your test of internal consistency and what it means.

Evaluate the Validity of the Scale

In addition to evaluating the factor structure and reliability of the Global Social Status scale, answer the questions below, which are related to the validity of the Global Social Status scale.

1. Investigate whether our new Global Social Status scale has concurrent validity with the Mahadevan Social Status scale. 

1. Investigate whether our online social status subscale has predictive validity with social media addiction. Investigate whether the relationship between social media addiction and self-esteem is mediated by online social status.  

The Sections of Your Report

Overall, you should write the Title, Abstract, Results and Discussions sections of the report as a coherent evaluation of the psychometric properties of the newly developed Social Status scale with the above three elements (factor structure, reliability, validity) as core features. The Introduction and Methods section will be written for you by Module staff – you do not need to include the introduction and methods in your report, instead, provide your abstract and title and then write ‘Introduction and Methods here’ then follow this with your results section, discussion section and your specific reference list. Specific word limits apply to different parts.

Abstract

This should be a concise but informative summary of the report. The word limit for the abstract is 150 words. Note that the word limit of 150 words is quite challenging, so leave yourself plenty of time to write and edit your Abstract. The Abstract should go at the beginning of the report (i.e., after the coversheet, but before the Introduction) on its own page. You may wish to write the abstract last.

Introduction + Methods section

These sections will be written by the module staff and given to you. You should not therefore write your own introduction or methods section for this report. You do not need to include the introduction and methods in your report, instead, write ‘Introduction and Methods here’.

Results section

Your results section should cover the analyses set out above. Make sure you fully address the analyses relevant to the questions above - remember to include how the data was analysed, all relevant descriptive statistics and all relevant inferential statistics.

You can use the structure and style of the RM1-4 practical answers as a template for your results section, but you must use your own wording to avoid issues of plagiarism.

Discussion section

Keep your discussion focussed on your findings, what they mean, and what more could be done in a future study to clarify any issues that could not be resolved by your analyses. Check the details of the week 6 seminar to ensure you are including discussion of all relevant content in this section of the report.

This Research Report has been solved by our PhD Experts at My Uni Paper.