Based on this reporter's procedures, are you confident that the quality of teaching at the university is "very good." Why or why not?

Question

) Read this description of a study and answer the question that follow.
A reporter at a university newspaper sought to gather evidence about the quality of teaching at the university. For one week at the beginning of the semester she attended 5 different, large-lecture classes each day, each with a different instructor. She asked 4 other reporters to do this too (they all attended different classes), and she trained them regarding the ratings they would make. The reporters pretended to be students, but sat in the back of class so the instructor wouldn't notice their observations. Using 10-point rating scales, they rated each instructor on five dimensions: interesting, organized, informative, friendly, and respectful. They summarized their findings and reported that, in general, the quality of teaching at the university is very good.

Answer 1

The reporter did not provide criteria (e.g., operational definitions) for determining what constitutes "very good" teaching. It's possible that the observers used different criteria when making their ratings on the 1-10 rating scale. Without more information about the criteria for judging the quality of the teaching, it is difficult to be confident about the conclusions. Thus, even if the reporters are reliable in their observations, the observations may not be valid. The reporter also generalized her findings to describe university teaching in general, when the observations were made only in large lecture courses during the first week of classes.