The purpose of a coding manual is to:

Provide a form onto which the data can be entered
Provide researchers with instructions about how to code the data
List all the categories that have been omitted from the schedule
Test researchers’ knowledge of statistics
Provide researchers with instructions about how to code the data  The coding manual is a set of instructions that helps coders decide how to assign codes to the textual data. It includes a list of all the possible categories and their corresponding code numbers. A good manual will include all the dimensions of the coding process and give guidance to coders to remove possible ambiguous inferences. We can understand how important it is when we consider some of the things that might go wrong in the coding process, like low inter-coder reliability, which would render an elaborate study fairly useless.
Reference: Bryman: Social Research Methods: 5th Edition Page(s) 293,294

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Which of the following is not an example of a ‘unit of analysis’?
A. Validity
B. significant actors
C. Words
D. subjects and themes
The data from each row in a coding schedule can be entered into a quantitative analysis computer program called:
A. Endnote
B. N-Vivo
C. Outlook
D. SPSS
Why did Warde sample food magazines from four different months in the year?
A. Because there weren’t enough food adverts in the first two magazines
B. To take into account any seasonal variation in the recipes included in the magazines
C. To find information from more than one form of mass media communication
D. Because he couldn’t decide which of the recipes were the most appetizing
If coders differed in their interpretations of the categories in the schedule, this could negatively affect the data’s:
A. Internal generalisability
B. Intra-interviewer reliability
C. Construct validity
D. Inter-coder reliability
Which of the following could be subjected to a textual content analysis?
A. Interview transcripts
B. Newspaper articles
C. Song lyrics
D. All of the above
Quantitative content analysis is an approach that aims to:
A. Objectively and systematically measure the content of a text
B. Reach an interpretive understanding of social action
C. Engage in a critical dialogue about ethical issues in research
D. Provide a feminist alternative to ‘male-stream’ quantitative methods
Why might a researcher want to count the frequency of certain words in a text?
A. It increases the reliability of the coding measures
B. It is a good way of finding out about the journalist’s favourite words
C. Emotive words can be used excessively to provoke a moral panic
D. It shows which words are most common in the English language

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