|






Pros and Cons of Primary and
Secondary Data
i  |

Secondary data ƛ data someone else

has collected
i  |


  i

County health departments

Vital Statistics ƛ birth, death certificates

Hospital, clinic, school nurse records

Private and foundation databases

City and county governments

Surveillance data from state government

programs

Federal agency statistics - Census, NIH, etc.

i  |






hen was it collected? For how long?

ƛ May be out of date for what you want to
analyze.
ƛ May not have been collected long enough
for detecting trends.
i  |






Is the data set complete?

ƛ There may be missing information on
some observations
ƛ Unless such missing information is caught
and corrected for, analysis will be biased.
i  |






Úre there confounding problems?

ƛ Sample selection bias?
ƛ Source choice bias?
ƛ In time series, did some observations
drop out over time?
i  |






Úre the data consistent/reliable?

ƛ Did variables drop out over time?
ƛ Did variables change in definition over
time?

E.g. number of years of education versus
highest degree obtained.
i  |






Is the information exactly what you need?

ƛ In some cases, may have to use Ơproxy
variablesơ ƛ variables that may approximate
something you really wanted to measure. Úre
they reliable? Is there correlation to what you
actually want to measure?
i  |





No need to reinvent the wheel.

ƛ If someone has already found the data,
take advantage of it.
i  |





It will save you money.

ƛ Even if you have to pay for access, often
it is cheaper in terms of money than
collecting your own data.
i  |





It will save you time.

ƛ Primary data collection is very time
consuming.
i  |





It may be very accurate.

ƛ hen especially a government agency
has collected the data, incredible
amounts of time and money went into it.
Itƞs probably highly accurate.
i  |





It has great exploratory value

ƛ Exploring research questions and
formulating hypothesis to test.
2 |

Primary data ƛ data you collect

2 |

  

Surveys

Focus groups

Questionnaires

Personal interviews

Experiments and observational study

2 |






Do you have the time and money for:

ƛ Designing your collection instrument?
ƛ Selecting your population or sample?
ƛ Pretesting/piloting the instrument to work
out sources of bias?
ƛ Údministration of the instrument?
ƛ Entry/collation of data?
2 |






Uniqueness
ƛ May not be able to compare to other
populations
2 |






uesearcher error
ƛ Sample bias
ƛ Other confounding factors
|

 

hat you must ask yourself:

ƛ ill the data answer my research
question?
|

 

To answer that
ƛ You much first decide what your research
question is
ƛ Then you need to decide what
data/variables are needed to scientifically
answer the question
|

 

If that data exist in secondary form,

then use them to the extent you can,
keeping in mind limitations.

But if it does not, and you are able to

fund primary collection, then it is the
method of choice.