Types of data

Cards (9)

  • Types of data Qualitative Quantitative
  • Qualitative data is expressed in words it is a written description of thoughts and feelings and opinions of participants Strengths-  Offers researcher a meaningful insight into participants
     Gives participants the opportunity to fully report their thoughts feelings and behavior’s
     Can tell us why a particular behavior occurs
    Weaknesses
     Less scientific
     Harder to analyze as it cannot be visually represented
  • Quantitative data gathers numerical data such as a number of words a person recalls in a memory experiment. Strengths-  Considered more scientific as it is objective  Easier to analyze through statistical techniques Weaknesses- • Does not offer a in depth picture of a topic
  • Primary and secondary research
  • Primary research is collected directly from the researcher by conducting a questionnaire interview or observation. Strengths-  Primary Data Is authentic as the researcher collects it themselves Weaknesses  Time consuming such as experiment planning preparing and resources
  • Secondary research is information which has already been collected by someone and data already exists such as journals articles books online info and statistical data Strengths-  Quicker and cheaper to conduct requires minimal effort  Desired information already exists so don’t need to conduct primary data Weaknesses-  The data may be outdated and information may vary challenges validity of conclusion
  • A meta analysis is where researchers combine the findings from multiple other findings from research which have similar aims or hypothesis
  • Meta analysis maybe prone to publication bias as the researcher may not select all relevant studies and leave out studies with negative results therefore the conclusions from meta analysis will be biased because they only represent some of the relevant data
  • Qualitative data has good external validity- because it provides researcher more meaningful insight into participants worldview as it's richer in detail