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English for
Academic and
Professional
Purposes
Quarter 2 – Module 5:
Gathering of Information
from Surveys, Experiments,
or Observations
EAPP – Grade 12
Self-Learning Module (SLM)
Quarter 2 – Module 5: Gathering of Information from Surveys, Experiments, or
Observations
First Edition, 2020

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Writer: Jean M. Dizon
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 What I Need to Know
This module is designed and written with you in mind. It is
here to help you recognize the importance of gathering of
information from survey, experiment, or observation. The scope of
this module permits it to be used in many different learning
situations. The language used recognizes the diverse vocabulary
level of students. The lessons are arranged to follow the standard
sequence of the course.

In this module you will be able to:

Gathers information from surveys, experiments, or observations
Specifically, you are expected to:
1. determine the importance of gathering information
2. explain the processes in gathering information
3. identify the importance of gathering information in various field

What I Know

Before we proceed to our lessons and activities, let us answer the following
questions to check first your prior knowledge about our topic.

A. Multiple Choice

A. TRUE OR FALSE
Directions: Write True if the statement is correct; False if it is
wrong. Write your answer on the space provided before each number

1. Survey is a technique which uses a questionnaire to gather

information from the respondents.
2. Primary data are normally carried out from a survey.
3. Finding the research problem is the final steps in conducting
an experiment.
4. Participants should be chosen based on her/his educational attainment
5. Identifying the objective is the primary step in conducting an observation
6. Telephone interview is a convenient way of conducting an experiment.
7. Sample represents the entire population.
8. Participants are the people who actually take part in the survey.
9. Defining variables is a process in conducting an observation.
10. Analyzing a result should be done after gathering of data.

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 Lesson Gathering Information from 7
Surveys, Experiments, or
Observations
In this lesson you will be taught on how to gather information from surveys,
experiments or observation which is very important in conducting a research. The
appropriate manner and tool that will support your studies is very essential in
writing your paper.

What’s In

Fill in the diagram below with the steps to follow in conducting a survey.

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 What’s New

How are you coping with our lesson? I hope you are curious
and excited about the activities we will discuss and learn in this module.

Activity 1: Student Survey: What Kind of Student are You?

Directions: Answer the following questions honestly.
1. What do you like to be called?
2. What is your favorite subject?
3. Do you think school is hard, easy or both during this new normal?

4. Do you think you are a good student?

5. Do you have a difficult time in learning new things?

6. Are you a good test taker?

7. Do you feel comfortable asking help from your classmates?

8. Do you need much time in working your school assignments?

9. Do you like to work alone or with other?

10. What would you like me to know about you?

What is It

Now let us study the concept related

to your activity.
Gathering of information from Survey,
Experiments or Observation

Survey is defined as the act of examining a

process or questioning a selected sample of individuals
to obtain data about a service, product, or
process. Data collection surveys collect information from a targeted group of people
about their opinions, behaviour, or knowledge.

An experiment is a data collection method where you as a researcher change

some variables and observe their effect on other variables. The variables that you

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manipulate are referred to as independent while the variables that change as a
result of manipulation are dependent variables
An observation is a data collection method, by which you gather knowledge of
the researched phenomenon through making observations of the phenomena, as and
when it occurs. You should aim to focus your observations on human behaviour, the
use of the phenomenon and human interactions related to the phenomenon.
Now let us learn how to gather information from survey, experiments or
observation.

Process in gathering information through survey:

Step 1: Determine your objectives

Each survey starts with a purpose or topic, which needs to be broken down into
objectives. Our objectives should be clearly defined, as they inform our questions and
data analysis. Make sure objectives are specific, measurable, and inform actions.

Step 2: Define the population (Population and sampling)

The group of individuals who are trying to research by conducting a survey
is called the population. It will start of by generating a list of all population
members, which we call a sampling frame. Respondents or participants are the
people who actually take part in the survey.

Step 3: Create a data analysis plan

Before designing a survey, an analysis plan is needed. This will ensure what
you think about everything needs to be analyzed, and how you can get statistical
results that will let you make an analysis. The easiest way to create an analysis
plan is to write out your survey objectives and how you plan to analyze each one.

Step 4: Designing the survey

After determining the objectives, population, sampling strategy, survey
method, and analysis plan. These will all help with the next step: writing questions
and designing our survey. Most surveys collect the following information:
Demographics of respondents, including age, gender, income, and level
of education, which can be used to describe the respondents and
compare groups of respondents.
Quantifiable information that can be analyzed statistically Open-
ended question allow users to input their own answer and do not provide
predefined response options.
Example: What do you like best about your job?
Closed-ended questions provide different types of response options from
which respondents can choose an option. In contrast to open-ended
questions, closed ended questions are easy to answer and allow us to
conduct statistical analysis on the results. A closed-ended question
include:
o Multiple-choice questions.
What is your favorite subject?
□ Math □ Language □ Science□ History

o Dichotomous questions: Provide with two (or three) options,

such as “yes” and “no”. They can also contain a third option,
such as “don’t know”.
Do you like Korean dramas?
❍ Yes ❍ No

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 • Rankings: Allow you to rank how important you think something
is, compared to other options.
Please rank the following in order of importance, from 1 to 4, where 1 is most
important.
Clean room☐ Lively room ☐ Quiet room with no distractions ☐ Fun room ☐

• Rating scales: Allow you to indicate how strongly you agree with something
or rate something.
Indicate to what extend you agree with this statement:
Having gadgets improves my interest in my studies
❍ Strongly disagree ❍ Disagree
❍ Neither agree nor disagree ❍ Agree ❍ Strongly Agree

Step 5: Pre-testing
It ensures the quality of responses that you look for problems, such as
badly-phrased questions and missing response categories.

First, we can do some tests by ourselves:

• Check different computers, tablets, phones and browsers to make sure
everything works well. For example: Do rating scales work on a mobile
phone?
• Check whether any contingency questions are skipping automatically.
• Be sure images, graphs, sounds, links and charts work and load.
• Look for style issues. Can you scroll down? Is the font easy to read?

Second, assemble a small group of people who have not seen the
survey before. Then let them take the survey, without offering any help or
clarification if they have questions. Afterward, you can talk to them and look
at their responses to see if there are any problem areas in our survey that
need correcting.
Finally, test the survey with a larger group of people and track how
they do it. You want to measure the time it takes to complete questions and
the entire survey, and you will be looking of which questions was skipped.

Step 6: Conducting the survey

There are different ways to distribute a survey:
• Send by email.
• Embed or advertise on a website or app, using a link.
• Using pop-up windows on a website or app.
• Posting on social media.

These tools can help with most steps in the survey process, including the
sampling frame, designing the survey, advertisement of the survey, and simple data
analysis. It can improve response rates to our survey in several ways:
• Use an appealing invitation to (or advertisement of) the survey.
• Keep the survey short.
• Offer respondents something in exchange for filling out the survey, such as a
discount on a product (but note that this impacts the sampling error).
• Follow-up invitations to remind people to fill out your survey.

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Step 7: Data analysis
Most survey tools include basic statistics and simple data analysis options.
Researchers should also analyze the way respondents took the survey.

Step 8: Reporting results

The last step is to report survey results. Depending on the purpose of
the survey, it might do things like:
• Write a report.
• Present the results in a meeting.
• Use the results as part of a larger research project.

Ways of Interviewing Respondents

Once you have selected your sample and developed your questionnaire,
there are several ways you can interview participants:

1. In-person Interviewing
When this method will be used, you meet with the respondents face to face
and ask questions. This technique has excellent response rates and enables to
conduct interviews that take a longer amount of time. It enable also to ask follow-
up questions to responses that are not clear. On the other hand, this method is
expensive and takes more time because of interviewer training, transport, and
remuneration.

2. Telephone Interviewing
Using this technique, the respondents can be called over the phone and will
be interviewed. This method offers the advantage of quickly collecting data,
especially when used with computer-assisted telephone interviewing and data
collection via telephone is cheaper than in-person interviewing.
This technique in gathering data has limitations; telephone interview had
difficulty in establishing trust due to this reason, this may result to inaccurate
responses or may introduce bias. Since phone interviews are generally kept short to
reduce the possibility of upsetting respondents, this method may also limit the
amount of data you can collect.

3. Online Interviewing
This technique is used widely because it is a low-cost way of interviewing
many respondents. Another benefit is anonymity; you can get sensitive responses
that participants would not feel comfortable providing with in-person interviewing
but the disadvantage of this technique is that you cannot seek clarification on
responses that are unclear.

4. Mailed Questionnaire
The printed questionnaires are sent to the postal address of the respondent.
The participants fill in the questionnaire and mail it back. This interviewing method
gives you the advantage of obtaining information that respondents may be
unwilling to give when interviewing in person.
The main limitation with mailed questionnaires is you are likely to get a low
response rate. The inaccuracy of mailing address, delays or loss of mail could also
affect the response rate. Additionally, mailed questionnaires cannot be used to
interview respondents with low literacy, and you cannot seek clarifications on
responses.

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5. Focus Groups
In using a focus group as a data collection method, identify a group of 6 to
10 people with similar characteristics. The responses are captured by video
recording, voice recording or writing—this is the data you will analyze to answer
your research questions. Focus groups have fewer resources and time as compared
to interviewing individuals.

Gathering Information through Observation

Observation guides may be useful in documenting what is being observed.

Various types of these guides may be developed, depending upon the purpose of the
observation. They are particularly useful in situations where the researcher wishes to
observe specific activities over a long period of time or in repeated observations.
In an observational data collection method, it acquires data by observing any
relationships that may be present in the phenomenon being studied.

Four types of observational methods:

1. Cross-sectional method collects data on observed relationships once. This
method has the advantage of being cheaper and taking less time as compared to
case-control and cohort. However, cross-sectional studies can miss relationships
that may arise over time.

2. Case-control method creates cases and controls and then observes them. A
case has been exposed to a phenomenon of interest while a control has not. After
identifying the cases and controls, it will move back in time to observe how the
event of interest occurs in the two groups.

3. Cohort method follows people with similar characteristics over a period. This
method is advantageous when you are collecting data on occurrences that happen
over a long period. It has the disadvantage of being costly and requiring more time.
It is also not suitable for occurrences that happen rarely.

4. Ecological method studies a population instead of individuals. Using ecological

method saves time and money because data is already available.

Gathering Information through Experiment

An experiment is a data collection method where you as a researcher change

some variables and observe their effect on other variables. The variables that you
manipulate are referred to as independent while the variables that change as a
result of manipulation are dependent variables.

Designing a study
Steps for designing a study:
1. Identify the variable (or variables) of interest and the population of the
study.
2. Develop a detailed plan for collecting the data. When using a sample, you
need to make sure that the sample is representative of the population.
3. Collect the data.
4. Describe the data using descriptive statistics.
5. Interpret the data and use inferential statistics to make decisions (or
assumptions) about the population.

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 6. Identify any possible errors (some potential problems can be identified
earlier in the process).

Collecting Data
This will focus on four methods for collecting data: Observational
studies, experiments, simulations, and surveys.
• In an observational study, a researcher measures and observes the
variables of interest without changing existing conditions.
• In an experiment, a researcher assigns a treatment and observes the
response. Sometimes, a control group (a group receiving no treatment or a
placebo) may be used to compare the effectiveness of a treatment.
• A simulation uses a mathematical, physical, or computer model to
replicate the conditions of a process or situation. This is frequently used
when the actual situation is too expensive, dangerous, or impractical to
replicate in real life.
• A survey is used to investigate characteristics of a population. It is
frequently used when the subjects are people, and questions are asked of
them. When designing a survey, you must be very careful of wording (and
sometimes ordering) the questions so that the results are not biased.

Experimental Designs

Definitions and Terminology

• A confounding variable occurs when an experimenter cannot tell the
difference between the effects of different factors on a variable.

• The placebo effect occurs when a subject (or “experimental unit”) reacts
favorably to a placebo when no medicated treatment has been given.

• Blinding is a technique used to make the subjects “blind” to which

treatment (or placebo) they are being given. A double-blind experiment is one
in which neither the experimenter nor the subjects know which treatment is
being given.
• Randomization is a process of randomly assigning subjects to treatment
groups. There are several different techniques for randomization:
o A completely randomized design assigns subjects to different
treatment groups through random assignment.
o randomized block design is sometimes used to make sure that
subjects with certain characteristics are assigned to each treatment.
o Matched pairs design pairs up subjects according to similarities. One
subject in the pair receives one treatment, while the other receives a
different treatment.

• Sample size is the number of participants in the experiment. The larger the
sample, the more representative of the population the results will be, but the
costs of the experiment will also be higher.

• Replication is the ability to reproduce the experiment (and results) under

similar conditions.

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Sampling Techniques

Definitions and Terminology

• A sampling error is the difference between the results of the sample and
those of the population.

• A biased sample is one that is not representative of the entire population.

Thus, it avoids biases.

• A random sample is one in which every member of the population has an

equal chance of being chosen.

• A stratified sample is used when it is important to have members from

multiple segments of the population. First, the population is split into
segments (called “strata”), then a predetermined number of subjects is
chosen from each of the strata.

• Cluster sampling can be used when the population naturally falls into
subgroups with similar characteristics. First, determine the clusters, then
select all the members of one or more of the clusters.

• Systematic sampling involves assigning a number to each member of the

population and ordering them in some way. Sample members are selected by
choosing the first member randomly, then selecting subsequent members at
regular intervals after the starting number (for example, every 7th person).
This method is fairly simple to use but should be avoided if there are
regularly occurring patterns in the data.

• A convenience sample consists only of available members of the

population, but this often leads to biased studies.

• A volunteer sample is a kind of convenience sample in which only

volunteers participate.

The greatest advantage of using an experiment is that you can explore

causal relationships that an observational study cannot. Additionally, experimental
research can be adapted to different fields like medical research, agriculture,
sociology, and psychology. Nevertheless, experiments have the disadvantage of
being expensive and requiring a lot of time.

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 What’s more

You have already gained insight on how to gather information from

surveys, experiments or observation. This time, let us do the activities and see
how much you have learned.

Activity 2: Answer Me!

A.Directions: Identify the words being described by filling out the boxes.
1

A way to gather data by watching people, events or noting physical

characteristics in their natural setting
2.

A structured conversation where the participant asks questions and the other
provides an
3.

It provides insight into cause – and –effect by demonstrating what outcome occurs
when a particular factor is manipulated.

4.

It is the collection of information from a sample of individuals through

their responses to questions.

5.

It is an instrument consisiting of a series of questions for thr purpose of

gathering information from the respondents.

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B. Answer Me!

Identify whether each of the following topics can be examined by observation

or not. Write “ Yes” on the blank if it is observable and “ No” if it is not.
1. Plant growth
2. Students’ beliefs about joining fraternities
3. The opinion of the parents on face – to- face classes

4. The behavior of emeetings employess during meetings

5. Cooking procedures followed by experience chefs

What I Have Learned

Now let us sum up what you learned from our lesson by answering
the questions below:

1. What are the steps in gathering information though survey?

2. How is the observational method of gathering information being

conducted?

3. What are the advantages of experiments?

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 What I Can Do

You have answered all the activities in this module and it’s time for you
to apply what you have learned.
Activity 3: Formulate a Survey Tool
Directions: Make your own survey questionnaire consisting of questions related to
the learning experiences you encountered during this new normal. Formulate at
least 10 questions only. Choose your participants from your household to answer
your survey questionnaires. (Follow the steps in conducting a survey)
Please be guided by the criteria for scoring your outputs.

Suggested Rubrics for Scoring:

Mechanics………….………….............. 20pts.
Organization.…….………..............…… 15pts.
Creativity and presentation……….….. 15pts.
Total………………………….............….. 50pts

Assessment

A. Multiple Choice

Directions: Read each questions carefully. Choose the letter of the correct answer
and write it on the space provided before each number.

1. Which of the following does not describe a good objective?

a. measurable
b. specific
c. realistic
d. smart

2. It is a process where researchers meet the participants face to face and

ask relevant questions.
a. panel interview
b. virtual interview
c. in- person interview
d. group interview

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3. It is a method of collecting data where the identified 6 to 10 people with similar
characteristics are group together.
a. focus group
b. small group
c. control group
d. case group

4. These survey questions comprise two or three options.

a. multiple- choice questions
b. dichotomous questions
c. open – ended questions
d. close – ended questions

5. These are questions that allow users to input their own answer and do
not provide predefined response options.
a. close – ended questions
b. open-ended questions
c. multiple- choice questions
d. rating scales

6. It is the observational method that follows people with similar

characteristics over a period.
a. ecological method
b. cross-sectional method
c. cohort method
d. case- control method

7. It is a method that creates cases and controls and then observes it. A case
has been exposed to a phenomenon of interest while a control has not.
a. ecological method
b. cross-sectional method
c. cohort method
d. Case-control method

8. It is a sampling technique which every member of the population has an

equal chance of being chosen as participants.
a. random sampling
b. cluster sampling
c. systematic sampling
d. stratified sampling

9. It is a sampling technique that consists of available members of the

population, but this often leads to biased studies.
a. bias sampling
b. convenience sampling
c. cluster sampling
d. volunteer sampling
10. It is the number of participants in an experiment.
a. Sample size
b. Population
c. Participants
d. Respondents

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B. TRUE OR FALSE
Directions: Write True if the statement is correct; False if it is wrong. Write
your answer on the space provided before each number

1. Defining variables is a process in conducting an observation.

2. Analysing a result should be done after gathering of data.
3. Sample represents the entire population.
4. Finding the research problem is the final steps in conducting
an experiment.
5. Primary data are normally carried out from a survey.

Additional Activities

Congratulations! You have come this far. I know you have learned a
lot about gathering information from a surveys, experiments, or observation. Now,
let us do this additional task.
Activity 4:

Imagine that you were tasked to revise the content of a questionnaire for a
study titled “Impact of Posting Students’ Speeches on YouTube on their
Speaking Performance.” Put a / before the indicator which should be included in
the questionnaire and X before those which should be excluded.
1. Posting my speech on the YouTube boosts my self-confidence.
2. Posting mu speech on the YouTube facilities
constructive feedback from my target audience.

3. Posting my speech on the YouTube helps me

electronically collect, store, and manage clips of my spoken performance.

4. Posting my speech on the YouTube helps me develops my

skills in speaking in formal events and occasions.

5. Posting my speech on the YouTube helps me evaluate

and reflect on my speaking performance holistically.
6. Posting my speech on the YouTube helps me improve my
skills in information and communications technology.

7. Posting my speech on the YouTube helps me improve my

skills in utilizing video equipment and applications.
8. Posting my speech on the YouTube helps me improve
my understanding of my abilities as a communicator.

9. Posting my speech on the YouTube helps me monitor

my progress as a communicator
10. Posting my speech on the YouTube helps me recognize
the gaps in my speaking skills at present.

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Answer Key
References
Book Sources

Barrot, J. (2017) Practical Research for Senior High School

Bueno, D. (2016). Practical Quantitative Research Writing for Senior High

SchoolMegrito, L (2016) Applied Research: an Introduction to Quantitative Research
Methods and Report Writing

Otero, R. (2016). English for Academic and Professional Purposes Worktext

Otero, R. (2016). Practical Research 1 Worktext

Online Sources

https://www.googgle.com/search questionnaire

www. personal-development-zone.com

https.//www. goggle .com/ gathers+ informations+experiments+survey

questionpro.com/blog/survey-data-collection