Research Methods for the Health Sciences

Research Methods for the Health Sciences

In s health sciences, researches, various variables are operationalised differently depending on their nature. This operationalization is categorized as continuous, dichotomous, categorical and ordinal (Stober, Dette & Musch, 2002, p. 370).

The table below shows how various variables are categorized

Variable	Operationalization
Age	Continuous
Gender	Dichotomous
Ethnicity	Categorical
Education	Ordinal
Income	Continuous
Marital status	Categorical
Weight	Continuous
Blood pressure	Continuous
Hypertension	Dichotomous
Body temperature	Categorical
Health insurance status	Categorical
Smoking status	Dichotomous
Cancer stage	Ordinal

Variable Name: Age
How operationalized: Continuous
How old were you on your last birthday?
Narrative: When age is operationalized in this manner, one would merely need to query the respondent to determine the age she turned on her last birthday. Alternatively, the researcher could ask the respondent to provide his birth date and year, and then calculate age at a later time.

Variable Name: income
How operationalized: Continuous

What is your monthly income?

Narrative: Income falls under continuous category. When inquiring about the income of the respondents, their level of income will be categorized into various ranges. For example, if such a question is asked, the researcher will be given a figure that denotes the amount of salary received. Likewise, the respondent may opt to provide the pay slip for the researcher to use it later.

Variable Name: Weight
How operationalized: Continuous

how many kilograms do you weigh

Narrative: The researcher inquires the weight of the respondent and notes it down.

Variable Name: Blood pressure
How operationalized: Continuous

What is you blood pressure

Narrative: The researcher will inquire the blood pressure of the respondent. If the respondent is not aware, then the researcher will have to request to measure the blood pressure and record it down.

Variable Name: Gender
How operationalized: Dichotomous

Narrative: Gender is operationalised as either female or male. Therefore, the researcher will have to indicate whether the respondent is female or male. There is no other way that gender can be indicated.

Variable Name: Hypertension
How operationalized: Dichotomous

Narrative: The respondents will be required to state whether they are hypertensive or no. therefore, there will be only two response of yes of no.

Variable Name: Smoking status
How operationalized: Dichotomous

Narrative: Smoking is also operationalised as dichotomous. The respondents will be asked whether they smoke or no. The options will either yes for those that smoke and no for those that do not smoke.

Variable Name: Ethnicity
How operationalized: Categorical

Narrative: Categorical variable normally has two or more categories (Nieuwenhoven & Klinge, 2010, p. 313). However, there is no intrinsic ordering to the categories. Ethnicity of respondents will differ and this is what will be recorded.

Variable Name: Marital status
How operationalized: Categorical

Narrative: Marital status is also operationalised as categorical because there are different variations or situations of marriages. Some of the respondents are married, others, divorced, some are still single, other engaged etc.

Variable Name: Body temperature
How operationalized: Categorical

Narrative: The body temperature of individual varies from one person to another. Even though the standard body temperature is 37 degrees Celsius, this is deemed to vary across different respondents.

Variable Name: Health insurance status
How operationalized: Categorical

Narrative: Not all people take heath insurance covers. Even though those that might have taken the cover may not be servicing them and therefore this mixed respondents will be recorded from various respondents.

Variable Name: Education
How operationalized: Ordinal

Narrative: Education status of people varies from one person to another. This will be captured using this operation because of the fluctuations.

Variable Name: Cancer stage
How operationalized: Ordinal

Narrative: Stage of cancer will also be operationalised using ordinal method because, the stages fluctuate.

Reference

Nieuwenhoven, L., & Klinge, I. (2010). Scientific Excellence in Applying Sex- and Gender- Sensitive Methods in Biomedical and Health Research, Journal of Women’s Health (15409996), 19(2):313-321.

Stober, J., Dette, D. E., & Musch, J. (2002). Comparing continuous and dichotomous scoring of the Balanced Inventory of Desirable Responding. Journal of Personality Assessment, 78, 370-389.

What is the difference between categorical, ordinal and interval variables? Retrieved from: http://www.ats.ucla.edu/stat/mult_pkg/whatstat/nominal_ordinal_interval.htm