Cat Hicks6d ago

This blogpost's sources are completely challenging my pre-existing assumptions about the methodological argument for using reverse-coded items on a survey. I might have to let the evidence totally change one of my scientific practices despite my intuitive feeling of what's "right." NEAT!

https://yannicmeier.de/2026/03/03/why-reversed-items-can-be-problematic-in-survey-research/

Why reversed items can be problematic in survey research

In quantitative psychological research, questionnaires with Likert-style items are mostly used to assess variables like emotions, cognitions, and dispositions. Sometimes, it is possible to fall bac…

Yannic Meier
Show threadDan Sugalski6d ago
@grimalkina oh, huh, that’s interesting. As a survey taker I dislike surveys that mix in negated questions because half the time I miss the negation (yay, reading comprehension I guess) but I never considered whether I weighed positive and negative adjectives describing the same thing the same. Seem unlikely I do, from this write up, and I suspect it’s dead on.
Show threadCat Hicks
@wordshaper it DEFINITELY makes it a more burdensome cognitive task for readers! But so much of psychology assumes that's worth it and now I don't think so
Mar 17 at 5:49pmWeb
Show threadDan Sugalski6d ago
@grimalkina I am now thinking we need a "Things People Think About Surveys That Are Wrong" that list the various things people don't think about but still cause distorted survey information.
Show threadmonstreline5d ago
@grimalkina @wordshaper in all honesty, if a survey switches back and forth (positive/negative) I run out of cognitive steam and either don’t complete the survey OR stop reading the questions and circle things randomly. But I don’t realize at the time that I’m doing it…my brain just switches to automatic behaviour mode and it’s only later when someone asks a follow up question that I realize I have no idea what I answered or what the questions were.
Show threadDavid J. Atkinson4d ago

@grimalkina @wordshaper Thanks for linking the article. Early in my career (late ‘70s) I worked on survey research and the importance of the positive/negative question method was drilled in, along with ordering effects and alternate wordings. The latter was designed to specifically address the fact that words are slippery and what you think might be a polar opposite may not be to someone else. The practical problem was/is that the various remedies end up growing the number of survey questions beyond reasonable attention of the subject. It is interesting to see these issues still coming up 45 years later! (P.s. My dad was a psychologist and Cronbach was a family friend. I was only 11 at that time (late ‘60’s) nevertheless, small world.)

My worry has always been about the quality of the statistical methodology and analysis in published studies. In my own area, 99% of the journal submissions I reviewed were essentially junk in this respect. So I applaud your attention to good science and statistical methodology,

Show threadCat Hicks4d ago
@meltedcheese @wordshaper what a delightful reply to get on this topic, thank you for sharing!! Really made me smile to think of Cronbach as a real person and not just a familiar statistical rule! His and collaborators' work on validity made a deep impression on me especially when I started working in education. As never-solved as these issues are, I feel as a social scientist it's my obligation to try to stay current on behalf of the people sharing their experiences with me :)