Social Psychology: Qualitative and Quantitative + Primary and Secondary Data

What is difference between quantitative and qualitative data?

Quantitative data

Qualitative data

- Expressed numerically - Aims to produce results that can be easily compared and analysed such as being converted into graphs. - Produces results that can go through statistical tests to see if they are significant. - Experiments, questionnaires and psychometric tests - Results from close ended or multiple choice questions

- Expressed in words, the data describes meaning and experiences - Aims to produce results which are meaningful - Aims to produce data which is in a natural setting, to understand the phenomena from the point of view of an individual and to understand the meaning that people give to their experiences. - Concerned with the interpretation of language from interviews, observations and other written formats. - Case studies, interviews and observations (although observations can produce quantitative data as well) - Results from open ended questions - Qualitative data starts out in words or pictures, usually lengthy paragraphs and this can be turned into numbers later e.g. you may interview people about their childhood and then later count how many times they mentioned their mother or father.

What are the strengths of quantitative data?

• Easy to analyse and shown on graphs and therefore easy to show comparisons between groups

• Statistics are usually less open to interpretation than words (more objective) which increases reliability

• It could also have high internal validity because the data is less subjective and so there is a higher chance that they are measuring what they intend to measure.

What are the weaknesses of quantitative data?

• Lacks the depth and detail of qualitative data

• Learn very little about participants’ thoughts (less meaningful)

• Doesn’t tend to have the same validity that qualitative data does as it doesn’t reflect how complex things are in the real world.

What are the strengths of qualitative data?

• More depth and detail than quantitative data, participant can fully express themselves which gives the research more insight, therefore seen as having more internal validity than quantitative data.

• Fully reports thoughts, feelings and opinions

• High ecological validity, provides insight into real life

• More meaning

What are the weaknesses of qualitative data?

• Difficult to analyse, researcher may have pages and pages from an interview transcript to deal with

• Conclusions and patterns drawn may be from the researchers’ point of view and can therefore be open to bias

What is the difference between primary and secondary data?

Primary Data	Secondary Data
- Can be qualitative or quantitative - Collected first hand by the researcher - Can be gathered using any research methods (interview etc) - Original data collected for the specific aim	- Data which is second hand so has been collected by someone else, so it already exists before the researcher does their investigation - May be accessed by looking in journals, books or on the web (already published)

What are the strengths of primary data?

- Suits the aim of the research as the researcher will know what data they require for their investigation

- Authentic, as it comes first-hand from participants themselves

- Source of the data is known (credible)

What are the weaknesses of primary data?

- Takes more time and effort, designing an experiment is costly and time-consuming

What are the strengths of secondary data?

- Easy to access, time taken to collect primary data is not needed

- Data is already checked, involving less time and effort

What are the weaknesses of secondary data?

- Studies conducted may not fit in with what researcher wants

- May be out of data not quite complete or of poor quality, meaning that using it may be a waste of time after all