What is a cross -sectional study?
When designing a research project, the study team has many data collection methods. A cross -sectional study is a powerful tool that captures data at one point from a large group of entities. Scientists usually collect data about their anticipated phenomenon, but also collect demographic and other relevant characteristics so that they can compare their findings with other groups. A cross -sectional study can be used in virtually any discipline that conducts scientific research.
The cross -section describes the time frame in which the study is performed. This is against a longitudinal study that captures data at several time points either from the same participants in the study or from similar funds. A cross -sectional study is usually cheaper than a longitudinal study because subjects may not be monitored over time. This type of analysis also does not suffer from the wear of the participants, as it does longitudinal research. The more advantage of cross -sectional studies is that data analysis can begin immediately after the collection is closed.
The cross -sectional study method has some disadvantages. Since the data is collected at one point, scientists cannot draw conclusions on the causal context. For example, if a researcher finds that heart disease is common among office workers, this research method excludes the claim that office work contributes to heart disease. In some cases, a cross -sectional study may not be feasible due to lack of participants. For example, in the case of a rare disease, the researcher may not have sufficient research to have sufficient research in order to conclude its hypothesis.
Scientists who have chosen a cross -sectional study can be confused by historical factors during data collection or earlier. For example, an outbreak studying emergency readiness does not have to obtain accurate results if he conducted a survey immediately after a big hurricane. Under the same circumstances, a longitudinal study wouldAla trends in emergency readiness and showed whether the hurricane had an impact on this phenomenon.
If the researcher wants to describe the prevalence of the time, he can choose a cross -sectional design of the study. For example, a team of scientists might want to learn more about autism and education. They could explore teachers about the number of autistic students in their classes, educational and behavioral characteristics of their students and resources that have autistic children available. Studies could also capture demographic characteristics such as gender of autistic students, age and level of level of students and region of the country in which the school is for comparative analysis.
cross -sectional and longitudinal studies describe the timing of data selection. Thus, a cross -sectional study can be combined with most quantitative research methods. A cross -sectional survey may ask participants to describe their experience with breast cancer. When studying the same disease, the analysis of cross -sectional content can explore how medical magazines approachThe breast cancer or how many articles are devoted to breast cancer research.