Data analysis chapter
Welcome to this week and this week what we're talking about is your analysis chapter because at this stage you've collected all your data and now you need to think about it and you present them in their findings chapter naive to think about what am I going to put in my analysis chapter so I'm speaking to dr. bernadette quinn today so thanks for joining us bernadette and so let's start with what's the difference between the flying news and the analysis chapter because sometimes people find that difficult yeah what i mean is it is a hard one.
I mean I the way I look at it is the findings chapter is and it's very descriptive so it's what you're found you know how many who are they where are they so it's very very descriptive and all you've really put into your findings chapter are your findings you know you haven't really commented on it yourself and neither have you gone back to your literature chapter and now this is where the analysis differs from the findings and sorry once you move into your analysis chapter now your job is to interpret those findings and now you must be really careful not to be repeating your findings that's the problem isn't it often is that what you read in the analysis is the same as the findings really try not to do that and I suppose the key thing is what you're trying to do here is to pull out what is important among those findings so you'll find a chapter you've got a great mass of update or whatever type it is but not all of it is equally important so the first thing you got to do is you've got to sift through let's find you the videos well which is important and which is not and that's the way of doing that yes that is the skill there yeah well it'll come from your understanding of the matter that you're sorting so if you've really you know gone into your list gone out and found something you now are an expert Donna so you're very knowledgeable on it and you just have to trust yourself trust your instinct I mean what is important I mean in your findings I suppose have people been saying similar things over and over again and it's something coming up all the time it's something looking problem massing or or it is something I'm really you know grasping your attention and it also comes down to teams doesn't is that we have to sort of start thinking now but exactly like what are the key issues and also start thinking back to what you raised in your lit chapter because a certain extent the findings chapter actually doesn't really bear much relation to what you did in your little chapter your findings is just this massive description it and to be honest it can be very boring yeah and that is what you have to watch out for as well in your analysis then as you say you are you're going to pull out what's important you're going to add in your interpretation of that and then secondly you're going to now link it back into the list so what has it been saying and where does your findings connect with the link absolutely wherever you can find connections that's what you're going to write about because that's what matters and it's also important isn't it the difference is that the findings isn't going to have any references in it because we're not referring back to anything whereas the analysis is back to the thing about trying to tie back in what you've identified in the literature to see are you finding the same thing or differently so in your finest chapters is not in there but findings nothing else where's in the analysis chapter there's your commentary on the findings which is newbs you haven't done that in the finest Junction plus there is the reintegration out of the literature so you'll be saying things like as Smith 2005 wrote about in his study of tourism destinations in Dublin we see that it's in the kind of thinking are dissimilar things are crying it doesn't really matter whether it's match or an off match and I'm sorry but what matters is that you can connect your fight back into it yeah yeah yeah okay and the other thing that's very important is what isn't it that some students miss is this to bring back into research questions that they forget what were the research questions that I wrote in my methodology chapter and I've seen some students quite successfully use the research questions as their headings if you like and then work on underneath them and that means that it's much more structured perhaps and and it provides focus for the chapter that can work quite well you were to ask me what makes a good analysis chapter I mean I think that's a key thing the structuring like think of the reader the reader has read through the findings and possibly that there's been a little bit information overall there and now they really need you to show them what's important and you do this by theming your analysis I would say so you pull out the big themes and then you use those as your section heads and very often as you say there'll be words in there that have come from your research question or have come from your objectives and and it's very important to note that the analysis chapter is what makes the breaks that the dissertation or thesis I mean that's the doc differentiates the really good students from the not-so-good students and it's very important students don't leave it til the end and just sort of write off you know five ten pages of more or less repetition but that's the one of the most important chapters maybe after that it review that they pay attention to I mean we're looking to see is your work going to is it going to contribute it doesn't matter how large or how small but it should add some new piece of of knowledge and this is where you want to make it in the analysis and the sort of the so part question so far as the purpose of the dissertation what have you found that actually makes why did you bother doing this because it shows me that x y&z yeah that's true but I think one of the key problems of people find is you know what goes into the findings workers into the analysis and you know that does take an awful lot of work but if you try and kind of stick to the couple of basic rules that the findings are just the pure description what you found and then don't repeat that then once you go into the analysis here don't repeat you know you you really mustn't do that reverb or the reader sailing yes and that is hugely important yeah and I mean there's a reason why in our marking structure we have different markings you know that the analysis is what is what we're marking not just the findings when it gets to that point yeah you know takes a weak skill to pull out what is important and you know the reader is looking for that and also takes time students need to give themselves time to work out one another you know you can only really do that well if you've engaged with your research and you really become comfortable with what you're doing and then it's all going to come to the fore in your analysis chapter okay great thanks very much so hopefully that will gives you some helpful tips in terms of thinking about the differences between your findings and analysis chapter and also the important thing to note is to give yourself enough time to write your analysis chapter and to engage in enough analysis and so that you're getting a good mark for that section of the dissertation or thesis.
See you next time.
I mean I the way I look at it is the findings chapter is and it's very descriptive so it's what you're found you know how many who are they where are they so it's very very descriptive and all you've really put into your findings chapter are your findings you know you haven't really commented on it yourself and neither have you gone back to your literature chapter and now this is where the analysis differs from the findings and sorry once you move into your analysis chapter now your job is to interpret those findings and now you must be really careful not to be repeating your findings that's the problem isn't it often is that what you read in the analysis is the same as the findings really try not to do that and I suppose the key thing is what you're trying to do here is to pull out what is important among those findings so you'll find a chapter you've got a great mass of update or whatever type it is but not all of it is equally important so the first thing you got to do is you've got to sift through let's find you the videos well which is important and which is not and that's the way of doing that yes that is the skill there yeah well it'll come from your understanding of the matter that you're sorting so if you've really you know gone into your list gone out and found something you now are an expert Donna so you're very knowledgeable on it and you just have to trust yourself trust your instinct I mean what is important I mean in your findings I suppose have people been saying similar things over and over again and it's something coming up all the time it's something looking problem massing or or it is something I'm really you know grasping your attention and it also comes down to teams doesn't is that we have to sort of start thinking now but exactly like what are the key issues and also start thinking back to what you raised in your lit chapter because a certain extent the findings chapter actually doesn't really bear much relation to what you did in your little chapter your findings is just this massive description it and to be honest it can be very boring yeah and that is what you have to watch out for as well in your analysis then as you say you are you're going to pull out what's important you're going to add in your interpretation of that and then secondly you're going to now link it back into the list so what has it been saying and where does your findings connect with the link absolutely wherever you can find connections that's what you're going to write about because that's what matters and it's also important isn't it the difference is that the findings isn't going to have any references in it because we're not referring back to anything whereas the analysis is back to the thing about trying to tie back in what you've identified in the literature to see are you finding the same thing or differently so in your finest chapters is not in there but findings nothing else where's in the analysis chapter there's your commentary on the findings which is newbs you haven't done that in the finest Junction plus there is the reintegration out of the literature so you'll be saying things like as Smith 2005 wrote about in his study of tourism destinations in Dublin we see that it's in the kind of thinking are dissimilar things are crying it doesn't really matter whether it's match or an off match and I'm sorry but what matters is that you can connect your fight back into it yeah yeah yeah okay and the other thing that's very important is what isn't it that some students miss is this to bring back into research questions that they forget what were the research questions that I wrote in my methodology chapter and I've seen some students quite successfully use the research questions as their headings if you like and then work on underneath them and that means that it's much more structured perhaps and and it provides focus for the chapter that can work quite well you were to ask me what makes a good analysis chapter I mean I think that's a key thing the structuring like think of the reader the reader has read through the findings and possibly that there's been a little bit information overall there and now they really need you to show them what's important and you do this by theming your analysis I would say so you pull out the big themes and then you use those as your section heads and very often as you say there'll be words in there that have come from your research question or have come from your objectives and and it's very important to note that the analysis chapter is what makes the breaks that the dissertation or thesis I mean that's the doc differentiates the really good students from the not-so-good students and it's very important students don't leave it til the end and just sort of write off you know five ten pages of more or less repetition but that's the one of the most important chapters maybe after that it review that they pay attention to I mean we're looking to see is your work going to is it going to contribute it doesn't matter how large or how small but it should add some new piece of of knowledge and this is where you want to make it in the analysis and the sort of the so part question so far as the purpose of the dissertation what have you found that actually makes why did you bother doing this because it shows me that x y&z yeah that's true but I think one of the key problems of people find is you know what goes into the findings workers into the analysis and you know that does take an awful lot of work but if you try and kind of stick to the couple of basic rules that the findings are just the pure description what you found and then don't repeat that then once you go into the analysis here don't repeat you know you you really mustn't do that reverb or the reader sailing yes and that is hugely important yeah and I mean there's a reason why in our marking structure we have different markings you know that the analysis is what is what we're marking not just the findings when it gets to that point yeah you know takes a weak skill to pull out what is important and you know the reader is looking for that and also takes time students need to give themselves time to work out one another you know you can only really do that well if you've engaged with your research and you really become comfortable with what you're doing and then it's all going to come to the fore in your analysis chapter okay great thanks very much so hopefully that will gives you some helpful tips in terms of thinking about the differences between your findings and analysis chapter and also the important thing to note is to give yourself enough time to write your analysis chapter and to engage in enough analysis and so that you're getting a good mark for that section of the dissertation or thesis.
See you next time.