Quantitative social scientists have adopted the positivist epistemology and methodology of natural sciences, seeking objectivity, generalisability, and neutrality. However, in social sciences -- unlike in natural sciences -- humans are both the investigators and the object of investigation, leading to intricate interconnections between researchers…

Researchers suggest that certain supportive behaviors of mentors could increase the benefits of school-based mentoring for youth. However, the literature contains few validated instruments to measure these behaviors. In our present study, we aimed to construct and validate a tool to measure the supportive behaviors of mentors participating in…

Using data from national socio-economic panel surveys in Australia, Britain and Germany, this paper analyzes the effects of individual preferences and choices on subjective well-being (SWB). It is shown that, in all three countries, preferences and choices relating to life goals/values, partner's personality, hours of work, social participation…

Background: Mentoring has drawn substantial interest from policymakers, intervention theorists, and those interested in identifying promising and useful evidence-based approaches to interventions for criminal justice and child welfare outcomes (Grossman & Tierney, 1998; Jekliek et al., 2002). Mentoring is one of the most commonly-used…

This chapter serves as a guide for quantitative researchers who seek to approach their research questions critically.

Investigated the relation between the understanding of desires for change and marital satisfaction. Subjects consisted of two samples, 77 married couples and 75 cohabiting and married couples. In both samples, the discrepancy index indicated that understanding was significantly positively correlated with marital satisfaction. (Author)

Some of the requirements and consequences of rigorous and valid educational evaluation research are explored in terms of problems in achieving two types of external validity, population and ecological. The former refers to the generalizability of inferences to subjects not included in a study, while the latter is concerned with the…

In addition to the usual problems of obtaining a representative sample, the family researcher is confronted with the problem of who speaks for the family. Traditionally women have been the informants in family research. To examine the coparental relationship between divorced spouses, data were collected from both former spouses (N=98 couples). The…