Interpretation of Research Results & Expected and

Unexpected Results

Prepared by:

Ginalyn A. ComendadorMS General Science EducationCentral Mindanao University

Education 241 Methods of Research in Education

Objectives:

1. Interpret research data;

2. Deal with expected and unexpected results

What does it mean that 55 youth reported change in behavior, or 25% of participants rated the program a 5 and 75% rated it a 4? What does these numbers mean?

Why Interpret Research Results?

Numbers do not speak for themselves.

For example,

What is Interpretation in Research?

Interpretation refers to the task of drawing inferences from the data that has been collected, analyzed, and presented after an analytical and or experimental study.

It involves making “inferences pertinent to the research relations” investigated from where generalizations are drawn (Calderon & Gonzales, 1993).

Interpretation reflects the researcher’s own understanding of the research results which are guided by logic and reason, established theories and previous findings.

Interpretation is the process of attaching meaning to the data

Putting it simply….

2 Types of Data to Interpret

• Quantitative Data

• Qualitative Data

Qualitative data includes narratives, logs, experience from Focus groups, interviews, open-ended survey items, diaries and journals, notes from observations and etc.

• demographic data

• answers to closed-ended survey items

• attendance data

• scores on standardized instruments

• etc.

Quantitative data are data that is numerical, counted, or compared on a scale

Qualitative data interpretation tends to be more subjective in nature and many times can be influenced by the researcher’s biases ( Leed and Ormrod, 2001)

Qualitative data requires understanding, digesting, synthesizing, conceptualizing descriptions of feelings, behaviors, experiences and ideas.

Interpreting numerical data or Quantitative data in order to make predictions is known as inferential statistics.

Some measures used in inferential statistics include the standard error of the mean, estimators and the p-value.

Techniques in Interpreting Research Results

• Give reasonable explanations of the relations found.

• Find out the thread of uniformity that lies under the surface layer of diversified research findings.

Expected vs. Unexpected Results

Do you consider negative results as equivalent to bad results? Yes or No

Questions:

How will you deal with unexpected results?

A contradictory result does not mean that the study is bad or incorrect, but it suggest the idea of further investigation.

An unexpected result maybe attributed to the research methodology- the research design, sampling procedure, the research instrument, data gathering procedure and statistical treatment.

Thank You for giving meaning to

my report