A WHISTLESTOP TOUR FOR NET RESEARCH

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A WHISTLE-STOP TOUR FOR NET RESEARCH

• Nigel Bradley
• University of Westminster

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RESEARCH STEPS

• Setting Objectives
• Literature review
• Secondary research
• Primary data collection
• Analysis
• Reporting

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SEARCH TOOLS

• Search engines
• Search agents
• Web-sites own search tools
• Related web sites

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LITERATURE REVIEW I

• Refereed journals
• contents list/index
• abstracts
• full articles
• Popular trade periodicals
• Newspapers

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LITERATURE REVIEW II

• On-line libraries
• catalogue searches
• e-mail enquiries
• Discussion Group archives
• Message Board archives

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SECONDARY RESEARCH I

• Intranet resources
• Extranet resources
• Closed groups (subscriber only etc)

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SECONDARY RESEARCH II

• Government
• Official bodies
• Corporate sites
• Academic sites
• Directories
• Census/Sample Survey results

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SECONDARY RESEARCH III

• ADVANTAGES
• speed
• variety
• quantity

• DISADVANTAGES
• relevance
• bias
• time to find/access

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PRIMARY RESEARCH TOOLS

• Question banks
• Questionnaire software
• Sample size calculators
• Tabulation software

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QUESTIONNAIRES

• interactive or static
• colour or not
• with/out edit checks
• with/out filters
• closed/open
• single scroll/multi-page
• e-mail or web-based

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ANALYSIS TOOLS

• Browser word-finder
• Text-analysis software (CAQDAS)
• Language translation software
• Currency converters
• Statistical significance calculators
• Statistical test selection aids

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REPORTING

• The Internet offers a fast, cheap and efficient
  method to deliver results
• Access can be controlled
• Software providers are meeting these needs

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CONCLUSIONS

• A rich store of resources are on offer to the
  researcher
• The major barrier is knowing how to find these
  resources

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KEY SITES

• Useful Article
• www.wmin.ac.uk/bradlen/papers/ tour.html
• Discussion Archives
• www.dejanews.com
• One-stop search engine
• www.askjeeves.com

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KEY SITES

• Statistics Primer
• www.cas.lancs.ac.uk/glossary_v1.1/samp.html
• Selecting statistical tests
• http//trochim.human.cornell.edu/selstat/sstart.ht
  m
• Sample size/significance
• www.surveysystem.com/sscalc.htm

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KEY SITES

• CIA World Factbook
• www.odci.gov/cia
• US Census Bureau
• www.census.gov
• Eurobarometer
• http//europa.eu.int/

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KEY SITES

• Language Translations
• http//babelfish.altavista.digital.com
  /cgi-bin/translate
• World Newspapers
• www.concentric.net/Stevewt/ international/

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KEY SITES

• Qualitative Analysis Software
• www.soc.surrey.ac.uk/caqdas
• The Question Bank
• www.soc.surrey.ac.uk/qb/