Continuous Assessment: Continuous Assessment

Continuous Assessment PS219 - Dr. Jane Walsh
(Exercise one - 20%)
Q. 1 You are interested in looking at the effect of exams on University students’ level of stress. You decide to test stress levels at baseline (during term time) and again during the first week of the exams and compare this group with a control group that have no exams during the same period of time. You anticipate that stress levels will rise significantly during the exam period. (i) How would you go about sampling 20 students from the class? Explain your answer (20%)
First of all, I would split the population of 20 students into two sample groups of 10 students, randomly assigning participants to their respective groups to allow group equivalence. To carry out this assignment I will use a simple random sampling technique; such as using a random number generator to generate 10 numbers, each number corresponding to a name on a list of participants in alphabetical order. These corresponding names will be the participants of sample group one.
Group one would sit exams during exam season, whereas the group two would have no exams to sit during the same season. The stress level of each participant would firstly be measured during term time – a number of weeks prior

Each participant’s responses for each occasion of completing the questionnaire will be calculated to obtain a mean numerical score between 1 and 5, with 1 being ‘not stressed at all’; 2, ‘very mildly stressed’; 3, ‘moderately stressed’; 4, ‘quite stressed’ and 5, ‘very stressed’. Each participant will obtain two numerical scores: one before and one during the exam