The crucial and most important academic task of dissertation requires a lot of planning and dedication in implementing it. It involves selecting a topic, collecting and analyzing data, presenting arguments and conclusions. Of all these stages the most important stage is the data collection and analysis stage. This is because most of the students spend major part of the time in data collection leaving them with less time for analysis and arguments. Before going to data analysis we need a good data to analyze it. The data must be collected keeping in mind the aim of the research and the target group. A perfectly collected data can lead to good analysis and proper outcome.
Depending on the nature of data and the research questions we can be able to analyze whether a hypothesis test is required or not. Also depending on the type of data collected we can make sure the use of statistical tools and techniques to analyze the data. Data analysis plan is most important and crucial as it provides the most important information for the researcher for their future research. The researcher needs to sort out the unwanted and unnecessary data for his/her research and go ahead with the other data. By doing so, it helps the researcher in saving time and eliminates confusion. Never a researcher must predict the conclusion based on the available data or even before collecting the data. This leads to bias in the research and hence leads to bad research.
Also not every research ends in number. Some research has quantitative data while some have qualitative data. Quantitative results can be presented n the form of tables and figures while qualitative information must be presented in a structured word format. A data analysis requires the researcher to choose the correct statistical tools, analyze the collected data and then present the interpreted data in results. As said earlier the data collection and analyzing is the most crucial part and so often time consuming. So it is better to take help of the guide or take assistance from a statistician to finish the analysis portion effectively and quickly.
Also there are many considerations that need to be looked into while analyzing the data. The researcher must study about which statistical tool is required to collect and analyze the data, arguments to defend the choice and use of statistical tools and techniques and potential problems while dealing with the analysis. Also he/she must think about the extent they wish to go in analyzing the data so as to save the time. A proper planning of analyzing data can save a lot of time for the researcher placing him on the safer side to prepare a beautiful presentation.
Data analysis plan can vary from one discipline to other and also based on requirements. And so data analysis plan is very important and requires a lot of care.