PGM0330 - DATA COLECTION AND ANALYSIS

Module Identifier

PGM0330

Module Title

DATA COLECTION AND ANALYSIS

Academic Year

2006/2007

Co-ordinator

Dr Graeme A M Davies

Semester

Semester 1

Other staff

Dr Anoush Simon, Dr Graeme A M Davies, Dr Milja H Kurki, Dr Allen E Foster, Dr Ian Archer, Dr Christine J Urquhart, Professor Martin J Barker, Dr Jamie Medhurst, Dr Mikel Koven

Course delivery

Lecture

41 Hours.

Practical

10 Hours.

Assessment

Assessment Type	Assessment Length/Details	Proportion
Semester Assessment	2,500 word Text Analysis. Analyse an historical or contemporary text.	30%
Semester Assessment	3,000 word Qualitative Essay. Write a piece of work which provides an overview of the methods that you would use to undertake a research project of your choice. You must use survey methods and three types of qualitative techniques. Justify your choice of methods and explain how these methods can be combined.	40%
Semester Assessment	2,500 word Quantitative Research report. Produce a report, on one of three options (specified during the module). In the report you should generate a set of testable hypotheses, discuss why variables were chosen and conduct univariate and multivariate analysis of those variables.	30%

Learning outcomes

On completion of this module, students will be able to:

Demonstrate competency in understanding and applying a range of research methods, to enable the collection of both quantitative and qualitative data
Display knowledge of the management of research data, and the use of IT in such data management
Demonstrate skills in conducting research in a manner which is consistent with professional practice
Demonstrate an awareness of the key skills involved in analysing quantitative and qualitative data

Brief description

This module is designed to be an integral component of the new RT masters courses which the University has introduced. Through this module Masters and PhD students will gain a broad knowledge of a range of methodological and analytical skills which they can apply in a variety of research contexts.

Aims

This module aims to give students a broad knowledge of a range of methodological and analytical skills, which they can apply in a variety of research contexts. The course is designed to give students a grounding in the basic principles of both qualitative and quantitative research methodology. It will provide students with an introduction to the major methods of qualitative data collection and analysis, how qualitative data are actively constructed and interpreted by the researcher, and an appreciation of the practical and epistemological concerns raised by qualitative data collection.This will include a consideration of questionnaire design, interviewing techniques, survey design and qualitative data analysis. This will be complimented by an analysis of the principles of quantitative research data and data analysis. The module will introduce students to the basic techniques of analysis, presentation and description of statistics, and in particular to SPSS using the PC Windows version.

Content

The module covers the following topics:

Qualitiative.

Combining methods
Data sources and context
Internet data collection
Sampling theory
Survey design and interviewing
Questionnaire design
The nature and use of qualitative data
Archival and documentary analysis
Focus groups
Participant observation
Semi-structured interviewing
Using Contemporary texts
Content and discourse analysis
Computer aided qualitative analysis (NVIVO)

Academic communication and Information seeking
Academic writing: bibliographic skills including ENDNOTE
Literature Searching
Literature review

Quantitative

Measures of central tendancy
Dispersion- SPSS
Analysing categorical data
Chi-square measure and association
Elaboration Analysis
Correlation Analysis
Introduction to regression
Interpreting regression coefficients and statistical significance
Multiple regression
Model fit statistics
Experimental Data collection and analysis

Notes

This module is at CQFW Level 7