DATA ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION

DATA ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION
After data have been collected from a representative sample of the population, the next step is to analyse them to the research hypotheses. Data are obtained through questionnaire, interviews, observation, or through secondary sources, need to be edited. The blank responses, if any have to be handled in some way, the data coded, and a categorization scheme has to be set up. The data will then have to be keyed in, and some software program used to analyse them. Each of these stages of data preparation is listed below.
Editing data
Handling blank responses
Coding
Categorization
Entering data
In data analysis we have three objective: the first is getting a feel for the data, which gives preliminary ideas of how good the scale are, how well the coding and entering of data have been, and so on. The second objective—testing the goodness of data—can be accomplished by submitting the data for factor analysis, obtaining the Cronbach’s alpha or the spilt-half reliability of the measure, and so on. The third objective—hypotheses testing—is achieve by choosing the appropriate menus of the software programs, to test each of the hypotheses using the relevant statistical test. The research of these tests will determine whether or not the hypotheses are substantiated.
SOME SOFTWARE PACKAGES USEFUL FOR DATA ANYLYSIS
Spss software packages
SPSS has software that can create surveys (questionnaires design) through the spss data entry builder, collect data over the internet through the spss data entry server, enters the data through the spss data entry station, and spss 11.0 to analyse the data collected.