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rm5.12_coding_and_data_display.ppt
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Chapter 12:
Coding and Data Display

  • Overview:
  • Basics of Data Analysis
  • Coding
  • Approaches to Data Display

Basics of Data Analysis

  • Reducing the complexity of the real world
  • Looking for patterns
  • Help answer public management questions & inform decisions that public managers have to make

Coding

  • Coding is a technique used to reduce the complexity of data
  • Codes serve to summarize data
  • Codes serve to make data comparable
  • Types of data that require codes
  • Coding existing text (very common)

Coding existing legislation or testimony for example

  • Interviews (see Exhibit 12.1, p. 223 for an example)
  • Field notes
  • Open-ended survey responses
  • Photos

Chunks and Codes

  • The unit of analysis and “chunks”
  • Example: You are coding all the laws made by the 110, 111, 112 & 113th Congress to determine which Congress was the most “environmental” across a few categories
  • Each law is a “chunks”
  • Types of codes
  • Descriptive codes: each category of “environmental” (water, air, etc.)
  • Attribute codes: identify who sponsored each bill, any other identification
  • Valence / magnitude codes: ranking the bills based on a predetermined order of “how environmental” each law is (1 – 5 for example)
  • Purposes of coding
  • Description
  • Pattern identification

Individual Coding

  • Developing your set of codes
  • Start with: What is your RQ and your Hypotheses
  • What are the key concepts you need to measure
  • What are the best metrics for you to use

Clarity

Consistency

  • A split-page approach

Using margins or matching pages

Again, see Exhibit 12.1, p. 223 for an example

Group Coding

  • Allows you to code a larger amount of data
  • Because there are more people
  • Complications of groups
  • Inter-coder reliability
  • Strategies for maximizing reliability
  • Clear codes
  • Training
  • Multiple people coding some percentage of the “chunks”

This helps you test inter-coder reliability

Improves your argument for internal validity

Data Display

  • Visualization of data
  • Another strategy for reducing complexity
  • Types of displays
  • Summary displays
  • Site displays
  • Time displays
  • Theoretical displays

Software for Coding and Data Display

  • Computer Assisted Qualitative Data Analysis Software (CAQDAS)

WeftQDA

Nvivo

Atlas.ti

  • Advantages of CAQDAS

Code management

Team coordination

Ease of coding

Ease of summaries

Use it

It is near impossible not to, certainly it makes your life WAY Easier