Things To Know About Using Secondary Data Analysis In A Dissertation

Even the best student or researcher can’t do everything themselves, at some point in time, they will require the assistance of a third party and this can introduce some new things to consider. One of the major problems that can arise is the competency of the person you employ provide you with information, your best bet is to work with a professional and this company can provide you with some options.

When using informational materials, compiled by someone else, there will be a period where you must familiarize yourself with the style of that person and this can be challenging. The following points will outline several features involved in using secondary data:

1. Know exactly what you want the data for

Secondary data was not originally intended for your purposes so you must be careful to be very specific about what data you want and your purposes. The data you receive will be formatted and would have been collected for a specific purpose so it is certain to be tainted on some level. Do not let the data you receive sway the direction of your research.

2. Familiarize yourself with the research style and data collection methods of the author of the secondary data

Take some time to review the work done by the team that originally collected the data. Familiarize yourself with their practices and methods, as well as their body of research. This will help you to better understand what the data represents and reduce the chances for misinterpretation.

3. The data was not specifically designed for your research, identify its shortcomings

Because the information was not collected by your team, it is likely that it will have ignored aspects of the phenomena that you consider important, but were irrelevant to the original team. Try to speculate and predict where these shortcomings will present themselves, being familiar with the original body of research will help here.

4. Since you did not collect the data yourself, you cannot be sure of its quality

Even if you happen to find secondary data that is very relevant to your research project, you still cannot be certain of the information contained within. Not to tarnish the name of any researcher, it is, however, unavoidable that humans will occasionally make mistakes, or over look some minor detail of significance. There is no way to avoid this, the best you can do is to try find additional, supporting data for any secondary data you may use.