Discussion:
In the book Essentials of Marketing Research, William R. Dillon, Thomas J. Madden, and Neil H.Firtle discuss a survey of marketing professionals, the results of which were originally published by Ishmael P. Akoah and Edward A. Riordan in the Journal of Marketing Research. In the study, randomly selected marketing researchers were presented with various scenarios involving ethical issues such as confidentiality, conflict of interest, and social acceptability. The marketing researchers were asked to indicate whether they approved or disapproved of the actions described in each scenario. For instance, one scenario that involved the issue of confidentiality was described as follows:
Use of ultraviolet ink: A project director went to the marketing research director's office and requested permission to use an ultraviolet ink to precode a questionnaire for a mail survey. The project director pointed out that although the cover letter promised confidentiality, respondent identification was needed to permit adequate cross-tabulations of the data. The marketing research director gave approval.
Of the 205 marketing researchers who participated in the survey, 117 said they disapproved of the actions taken in the scenario.
Construct a 90%, 95%, and 99% confidence interval for the marketing researchers to disapprove the actions taken in the ultraviolet ink scenario.