One of the most widely controversial and contemporary issues in today’s world revolves around depression and the increasing numbers of individuals who are diagnosed with depression. It may benefit some patients and even clinicians to conduct a quick and easy depression survey before they get into a costly affair. Although, a more effective measurement would require a more elaborate testing measure, the depression survey designed will determine quite simply if further assessments and testing is needed for depression. In this paper, the steps taken to create and design this survey are provided along with the purpose of the survey, the preliminary design issues experienced during its creation, and instructions for …show more content…
administering, scoring, and interpreting the survey.
The creation of a survey must first begin with a plan and a purpose.
A survey, just like a test will provide information in the form of measurement related to a particular subject. Because depression is a common issue and can be measured by an attitude survey the creation of this particular survey first began here. The plan for the survey is to act as a quick and handy reference to clinicians and patients who feel that depression may be a factor in mental care or treatment. The test is simple, easy to administer, easy to understand, and can be used for men and women of all ages. With these things in mind, the following purpose statement was created, “The Depression Survey is designed to conveniently and quickly measure some of the main symptoms of depression among patients who feel they may have or struggle with depression.” From the name and purpose, the survey then required some consideration of preliminary design issues. This particular test will produce one score, it can be administered to a group or individuals, and incorporated the use of select response. In fact this particular survey is designed like the Lilkert-type format which gives testers five options to choose from. These choices range from “strongly disagree” to “strongly agree”. Basically testers will read each of the statements provided in the test and select an answer which best describes how they feel to the statement being …show more content…
made.
Preliminary design issues arise in the creation of any test.
The Depression Survey was without exception generating a multitude of questions like, what should the purpose be? Are the test items valid and do they serve the purpose of the test? The most challenging of issues in the preliminary design came when creating the fifteen items in the survey. It is important to create statements that are valid and can be scored in the proper format. Questions about math or other subject matters would not produce answers relevant to this type of survey or serve and valid purpose. Creating fifteen statements relevant to depression requires some background research on depression. The choices are also an important factor when creating statements. Each statement in the Depression survey relates to depression and will produce a score that will help determine if a person or persons are suffering from some of the common symptoms of depression. The scoring in the test will range from 1-5. 1 for each “strongly agree” choice and 5 for each “strongly disagree” answer. The test scores will range from 15-75 depending and the choices selected by the tester. A score of 45 or less will defiantly yield some signs of depression where as a score of 15-30 would strongly suggest depression is a factor. The interpretation of the survey requires much more background research and in effort to provide a simplistic explanation of attitude survey design this survey has provide general
information.
Conclusion
After selecting a contemporary issue to help design and create a survey it is important to determine a purpose and a plan. The reliability and validity of a testy strongly depends on the items selected for response and how the test will be administered and scored. By following design and creation instructions and test or survey that helps generate a measure of information will prove beneficial to it users. There are many steps taken to create and design a survey. First start with determining the purpose of the survey, consider preliminary design issue, prepare the test items, conduct and item tryout, complete standardization and ancillary research programs, and then prepare the test materials.