Research methods differ in which party bears the burden of decoding meaning

Evidence

The greater burden of decoding is on the one who answers. Essay examinations, and also interview protocols and projective data, present the complementary problem of communication. The respondent is free to formulate his own answers, but the inquirer must try to figure out what he means by them. The greater burden of decoding is on the one who asks. The Berkeley investigators, like some teachers, seem to have believed that the best hope of discovering the truth lay in a combination of the two methods. — John T. Jost and Jim Sidanius, Political Psychology, 498

Categorization

• DEFINE: Captures the division between fixed-response and open-response measures in terms of where decoding burden falls — a useful conceptual framework.