ANALIZING DATA

ANALIZING DATA

1. Assembling your data

   • Collect all the data you have as well as any ongoing reflections you have made about them.
   • Observe the results of the plan
   • Review your initial and/or your revised questions
   • Start going through your data and look for broad patterns, ideas or trends that seem to answer your questions.

2. Coding the data

   • Based on the broad picture you have developed, start refining it by coding your data into more specific patterns or categories
   • Identify which of your data sources you can code qualitatively (e.g. journal entries) and which you can code quantitatively (e.g. questionnaires).

3. Comparing the data

   • Once your coding is complete, compare the categories or patterns across your different sets of data (e.g. interviews compared with surveys) to see whether they say the same thing or whether there are contradictions that you can highlight
   • Develop tables, bar/pie charts or sets of quotes to set the data out and display them in a concise form

4. Building meanings and interpretations

   • Think deeply about what the data are saying by reflecting beyond the immediate surface details.
   • Look for more abstract ‘big picture’ concepts and not just step-by-step descriptions of what you have found.
   • Pose questions, identify connections, and develop explanations about what the research means at the broadest level of your understanding of it.
   • Refine your own ‘personal theories’(more about these in Chapter 5) about the meanings of this research.

5. Reporting the outcomes

   • Think about how you can present your research and what you have found to tell others
   • Consider how you will organise the whole ‘story of your research’ from beginning to end and not just the analysis and findings.