QUESTION 3!
i)
ii) The overall distribution of score in the bar chart shows that the majority of students, 71.3% of students with a frequency of 174, mostly agree with the statement that 'Staff are good at explaining things'. Which is considerably higher than the percentage and frequency of students who either, definitely agreed, neither agreed nor disagreed, and mostly disagree with the statement. These are distributed as follows; 12.3% of students which is a frequency of 30 Neither agreed nor disagreed with the statement 9.8 % of students which is a frequency of 24, mostly disagreed with the statement and the lowest being 6.6% of students which is a frequency of 16 who definitely agreed with the statement.
iii) When comparing Figure 1 and my findings I can see that similarities that can be seen are that, the majority of students mostly agree with the statement that 'Staff are good at explaining things' in both my findings and figure 1. Also no students defiantly disagreed with the statement in either figure 1 or my findings. However differences are that, in figure 1 the least amount of students chose the category ‘Mostly disagree’, whereas in my findings the least amount of students chose that they ‘defiantly disagree’ with the statement. Possible explanations for these differences could be that teaching styles and techniques have changed since 2006 and new technology has been produced, such as interactive white boards, and there is also easier and more open usage of emails so that you can contact staff if u don’t understand something, which all may have contributed towards helping staff to explain things better. However it is very difficult to compare figure 1 to my findings in terms of figures, as figure 1 looks at the number of students and my findings look at the percentage of students. Also figure 1 shows answers given by sociology and social policy students, whereas my finding show answers from research method students, this is a problem when comparing as different staff teach different subjects. Another problem when comparing findings between fig 1 and my findings is that a greater number of students took part in my findings than in figure 1.
QUESTION 4.
i)
ii) You cannot use the arithmetic mean for the status ladder for either males or females, because it is a categorical variable. The arithmetic median and mode however can be used. The median for males was 6 and the median for females was also 6. The mode for males was 7 and the mode for females was 6.
QUESTION 5.
a)
i)
51 out of 173 of female students smoke
Which can also be written as:
29.5 % as a percentage
51:173 as a ratio
51/173 as a fraction
39 out of 90 smokers are male
Which can also be written as:
43.3 % as a percentage
39:90 = 13:30 as a ratio
39/90 = 13/30 as a fraction
iii).
Looking at the table I can see that a greater number female’s smoke (97) compared to males (173). The same goes for males and females that don’t smoke. Also there are more males (58) and females (122) that don’t smoke than males (39) and females (51) that do smoke. I can see that overall double the number of students who took part in this survey don’t smoke than those who do smoke. Overall, females are higher in all categories when compared to males. This could be due to the fact that a higher number of females (173) took part in the survey compared to males (97). However if you look at percentages it is easier to compare results. I now can see that actually a higher percentage of males (40%) smoke compared to females (30%). This is the opposite of what was able to be observed in table 1.
Word count - 149
Table 2. Smoking behaviour by sex.
b) The variable I have selected is age. I found a study that was carried out to determine the current use of cigarettes amongst young people aged 15 – 19. (Journal of School Health, 2009). I decided age would be an interesting variable to research. Therefore my hypothesis is that age influences smoking behaviour.
I have created a cross-tabulation to see the results. From the table I can see that the age with the highest number of smokers and non smokers is 18-21 year olds. This could be due to a greater number of this age range being available. However it is clear to see most categories have more non smokers than smokers. Whereas under 18’s have 3 smokers compared to just 1. When looking at percentages this age have a higher percentage of smokers than other ages. It is clear that age does affect smoking behaviours as more under 18s smoke.
Word Count- 150
Part B
The UK transplant, organ donating website for the NHS is a website aimed at getting people to sign up on the organ donating register and give their organs to the NHS when they die and no longer need them. In order to help save the lives of people who need organ transplants. The website is a community group aimed at giving information about organ donating and how to sign up to be an organ donor. The website also gives reasons as to why people should want to donate organs, and uses very persuasive language in order to do this. Anyone can sign up to be on the organ donating register no matter what ethnic groups they come from, or religious views they have, as none of the major religions in the UK object to organ and tissue donation and transplantation. Successful transplants are carried out between people from different ethnic groups wherever the matching criteria are met. There is no age limit for who can sign up to donate their organs; anyone of any age can sign up to be on the organ donating register. In the case of cornea and some other tissue, age does not matter. For other organs it is the person’s physical condition, not age, which is the deciding factor. Specialist healthcare professionals decide in each case which organs and tissues are suitable. However children who are under 12 in Scotland and under 18 in the rest of the UK at the time of registration will require their parent or guardian’s agreement for donation to take place. You can also specify which organs you would wish to donate. There are only two conditions where organ donation is ruled out completely. A person cannot become an organ or tissue donor if they have been diagnosed with HIV or have, or are suspected of having, CJD.
The site is trying to get as many people as possible to sign up to be on the organ donor register, and agree to give their organs to the NHS when they die. They do this in order to save other lives of people who are in need of organ transplants. It is also trying to raise awareness about donating organs and how important it is that more and more people sign up to do this everyday. If more people become more aware about organ donation and sign up then more lives will be saved that normally wouldn’t. The site is trying to be as persuasive as possible to draw people to read further on the site and to find out more about how donating helps save lives. This is to get across the point that, many people are in need of organ transplants and would be wrong for people to ignore the site knowing one day they will not need their organs. If more people sign up then the people who have died may still be alive today. It wants people to ask questions about donating organs, so the use of a FAQ page is there to answer all their questions regarding donating. This achieves peace of mind for people’s unanswered questions, as it answers them and helps them to feel like they know everything they need to about donating their organs. The site tries to help people feel good about themselves and feel a sense of achievement knowing they have helped many people after their own life is over. It will make people feel good about themselves knowing they are doing this. The site also raises awareness of giving blood and provides a link to the NHS blood donating homepage. The website also offers more than 3,700 secondary schools in the United Kingdom a free education resource to raise awareness of blood, organ, bone marrow and tissue donation, this also raises awareness for children as well as adults.
The site tries to achieve its aims by using very persuasive language. Throughout the whole website there are constant reminders of reasons for why you as a reader should donate. “Today more than 9,000 people in the UK need an organ transplant that could save or dramatically improve their life. Most are waiting for a kidney, others for a heart, lung or liver transplant. But less than 3,000 transplants are carried out each year.” The use of this passage makes people more aware of the seriousness of donations. There are also lots of pictures throughout the website which draw in you as a reader’s attention and make you’re more interested and intrigued to read more about donating organs, for example there are a number of pictures showing people smiling and laughing showing you that these kind of people are normal everyday people, who are thankful for someone saving their life and giving them a second chance in life. There is also the organ donating symbol of the heart which represents the reason behind the site, which is to make the community stronger by more people sharing their organs and sharing the love. There is also a picture of a super hero on the home page stating that you should register and become a donor to enable your status as a superhero. Many people will be persuaded by this. When you then click on the link on the home page, it takes you to a page saying ‘I want to be a super hero’ and if you follow through the links it takes you to the register page saying ‘become a real superhero’. There are also many statistics throughout the website showing how many people are already members and the website saying thank you to those people. “Thank you! To the 16,070,060 people – 26% of the population – who have said they want to help others to live after their death by joining the NHS Organ Donor Register.”It also gives people who sign up a Sense of achievement as they will help to save a life. The site has a page about the waiting time for transplants. This can show people how serious donating is as for example there is an 841 day waiting list for adults needing a kidney. These statistics have a massive impact on donation. The website also contains lots of information which enables people to understand completely the in and outs of becoming a donor before they make their final decision whether or not to sign up. The website also offers more than 3,700 secondary schools in the United Kingdom a free education resource to raise awareness of blood, organ, bone marrow and tissue donation, this also raises awareness for children as well as adults.The website is also very popular and contains figures with in showing how popular organ donating actually is. For example different celebrities who have joined the organ donor register. When you become a donor you receive a donor card with you name on that you carry round with you, and if anything did ever happen to you the doctors and surgeons would straight away be able to find this card on the person and see that they give permission to give their organs. This Donor card draws people in and makes them proud to own one, which in turn makes that person look very giving and caring of others and the world around them.
The implied meaning the site is trying to give is that if you become a member of the NHS organ donating and are put on the organ donor register to give your organs and you will save lives. It is trying to get as many people to sing up on the organ donating register so that more lives can be saved throughout the world. As improved medical and science has allowed and made it safe to transplant almost any organ into a human body and it be successful in saving that person’s life. The site also is trying to open people’s eyes to see the huge amount of people who are around them and walking with them day in and day out that need transplants but who can’t have them because not enough people are willing to give their organs when they die. It is a wakeup call as to how you as a person can help save someone’s life or maybe even 2 or 3 peoples live. The organ donor website achieves its implied meanings by more lives being saved by transplants due to more people signing up to donate their organs after death. Without the site many people would be aware or even acknowledge that people need organs to stay alive when others don’t. The website is a great way of raising awareness and getting people to donate.
Word count- 1438
Reference part A
Can G, Topas M, Oztuna F, Ozgun S, Can E, Yavuzyilmaz A. Journal of school health- Factors contributing to regular smoking in adolescents in Turkey, 2009. 3; 93-97. Blackwell Publishing Limited.
Reference Part B
NHS. Blood and transplant [online] available at: [last accessed on 22/04/2009]
