Primary and Secondary Data

Primary Data - Evaluation Strengths ETHICS

- Collecting primary data means that researcher(s) are in contact with their participants and can be sensitive to any issues that arise, such as distress of a participant

Primary Data - Evaluation Strengths RELIABILITY

- Reliable as the researcher knows how the research was collected and therefore can replicate to verify data

Primary Data - Evaluation Strengths VALIDITY

- The data are being used for the purpose intended so are likely to be relevant to the study compared to secondary data which is more likely to adjust the data therefore primary data is more valid

Secondary Data - Describe

- data that has already been collected by someone else - this could be information in the form of a census or an organisation's records - it may be primary data from other researchers that is re-used for a different purpose - evidence / data taken from publications / media such as newspaper articles or on TV programmes can be used as secondary data - data that is produced for another purpose such as statistics in a newspaper article - a meta analysis is the most common research method to use secondary data

Primary Data - Describe

- information collected first hand by the researchers - the material from an interview or questionnaire you conduct yourself is primary data - presents original thinking or new information - can be qualitative or quantitative, depending on the method

Primary Data - Evaluation Weaknesses ETHICS

Primary data collection is more likely to exploit potential participants than secondary data, therefore contain more ethical issues such as consent and deception

Primary Data - Evaluation Weaknesses LESS DATA

Primary data sets are often quite small so may be harder to draw conclusions compared to meta analysis of secondary sources

Primary Data - Evaluation Weaknesses RESEARCHER BIAS

There may be a danger of personal bias on the part of the researcher which could affect the data collection risking the validity of results

Secondary Data - Evaluation Strengths COST & TIME EFFECTIVE

cost & time-effective as researchers don't need to incur the expenses of data collection for themselves

Secondary Data - Evaluation Strengths ETHICS

less likely to be ethical issues such as informed consent as the data are not collected from people directly & information is already in the public domain

Secondary Data - Evaluation Weaknesses RELIABILITY / VALIDITY

reliability / validity of the data are unknown so the analysis may be flawed because of some original errors

Secondary Data - Evaluation Weaknesses DIFF Q

there may be problems with the use of and interpretation of data as the data were initially collected to ask a different question