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ប្រធាននាយកោឋន ា ប្ាវប្ាវ និងទំនាក់ទំនងអនតរាតិ
ាោភូមិនទរដ្ឋបាល
Tel: 012 660 114
Email: bunthoeun_thun@yahoo.com
Lecture 5: Secondary Data
Collection and Analysis
Content

• Definition
• Why to use secondary sources/data
• Advantages of using secondary data
• Issues to consider
• Secondary data sources
• Analysis

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Definitions
• Secondary sources:
• Information/data which has already been collected by other person(s) or
organisation(s) for different purpose from your own.
• Secondary data analysis:
• “any further analysis of an existing data set which presents interpretations,
conclusions or knowledge additional to, or different from those presented in
the first report”

• Hakim, C. (1982:282) Secondary Analysis in Social Research: a guide to data sources and methods with
examples. London: Allen and Unwin.

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Why using secondary sources / data
• To analyse or re-interpret data for a different purpose from that which
it was originally intended.
• Comparing information or testing correlations between different
variables to answer a research question.
• To make use of available data in exploratory phase of research when
we seek to define the research problem.
• To improve our understanding of a problem and the route of enquiry
that we take to investigate the problem.

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Advantages of using secondary data
• Sometimes primary data collection simply is not necessary.
• Secondary data may be all that is needed to draw conclusions and answer the
question or solve the problem.
• Examination of secondary sources can give much more information than a
primary data collection exercise.
• The time taken to search for secondary sources is a lot less than that
needed to complete primary data collection.
• The verification of secondary data is relatively straightforward in
comparison with validation of primary data.
• Secondary sources can provide more accurate data than primary research
based on relatively small sample sizes.

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• Some secondary sources are very extensive and representative.
• Allows focus on analysis and interpretation not data collection
• Allows time series analysis/longitudinal perspective
• Inaccessible populations can be reached
• Fewer ethical problems

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Issues to consider

• Data/information availability
• Quality of the data/information available
• Sample/survey design and size
• Confidentiality and ownership

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• What sort of information/data do I need?
• What sort of information/data exists?
• How can I get the data/information from?
• Is the information from a credible source?
• Do the categories collected reflect my research questions?
• Is data measuring similar phenomena and drawing conclusions about
relationships?
• Is data compatible with my context?

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• What was the original purpose for which the data was collected?
• What kind of data is it, and when and how was the data collected?
• Is it current (not too out of date)?
• What cleaning and/or recoding procedures have been applied to the data?
• How will I analyse and make sense of the information/data I collect?
• How are important measurements defined?
• What light can this data/information throw on my research questions?
• Is the data compatible with other data?
• Can they be combined?
• Can they be compared?

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Secondary data sources
Type:
• Quantitative data sets
• Survey data – income, health and education statistics, business statistics,
economic performance statistics, opinion polls, household surveys.

• Qualitative data sets

• Text based sources – theoretical literature, journal articles, books, case
studies, interviews, life histories.

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Sources:
• Journals
• Quality, reliability
• Search using e.g. science direct, proquest, web of knowledge.
• Books
• Timeliness, quality, reliability
• Reports from Development Institutions
• World Bank
• IMF
• UN agencies
• UNIDO, UNCTAD, UNICEF
• UN-WIDER
• DfID

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• International NGO’s
• Political factors and orientation
• Government sources
• Quality, compatibility
• Business institutions and companies
• Statistical data bases
• OECD, WDI, Comtrade, etc.
• http://data.worldbank.org/indicator
• For UK data sets there are the UKDA (UK data archives)
• http://www.data-archive.ac.uk
• ESDS (Economic and social data service)
• http://www.esds.ac.uk

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• Institutional websites
• Individual organisations and professional bodies
• Eldis subject gateway,
• Web of knowledge
• SSRN (Social Science Research Network)
• Metalib has numerous portals to statistical data bases for social scientists and
economists
• Newspapers. Magazines
• e.g. The Economist, The Financial Times, The Guardian, and their websites

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Analysis process
• Define the question you want to study
• e.g. How does the experience of racism affect an individual’s health?
• Specify the population you want to study
• Children, adults, or people of all ages?
• What races or ethnicities?
• Specify what variables/aspects you want to include (exclude) in your
analysis
• Specify what kind of data is most appropriate for your research
question
• National survey, examination of records, transcriptions of interviews?
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• Create a list of data sets that include information related to your
research questions
• Examine the variables you intend to use for the analysis
• Look for missing data.
• Find about the data collection process

• Boslaugh, S. (2007) Secondary Data Sources for Public Health: A Practical Guide. Cambridge,
Cambridge University Press

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Choosing an approach
Questions to consider
• What is the purpose of my study?
• To produce a credible work of research which has value in my field of study
• What is my audience?
• Academics? Policy makers? Business sector? NGO’s / development
practitioners?
• What is my theoretical position?
• Positivist or interpretive?

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Is ‘intensive’ or ‘extensive’ method better?
• Intensive: focus on studying a specific part of a problem
• Extensive: a broad exploration of a problem
• Both can use qualitative and quantitative methods

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Do I use quantitative or qualitative data or both?
• Inductive or deductive approach
• Deductive e.g. hypothesis testing (from theory to case); predicting what/why
some thing might happen
• Generally quantitative
• Inductive e.g. Grounded Theory (from case to theory)
• Generally qualitative
• Meta-analyses
• Qualitative and quantitative

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• Qualitative analysis
• Not numbers
• Common forms of information/data collection
• Participant observation
• Individual interviews
• Focus group discussions
• Documentary analysis
• Advantages:
• Tries to explain/explore causality and deal with complexity

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• Disadvantages:
• Hard to communicate effectively
• Can be context specific and usually more time-consuming
• Data cannot usually be statistically analysed, though numbers can be used
• Data collection is more time consuming, therefore smaller and more local
samples may have been used
• Data collection tools are more loosely structured

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• Quantitative analysis
• Emphasis is on collecting measurable information
• Data analysed statistically
• Data may cover large samples
• Data collection tools may be highly structured
• Data includes:
• Questionnaire surveys, highly structured interviews, socio-economic information,
demographics, etc.

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• Advantages:
• Reveals broad relationships, gives ‘measurable’ estimates
• How much, how often? etc.
• Study’s findings are often generalizable.
• Disadvantages:
• Lack of explanatory power, and open to simplistic assumptions
• May not account for context & complexity

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