outline defining the Data to collect using this information:

I don't know how to put this in an outline.

People	Position	Physical Components or Chemicals	Paper/Electronic
X	Investigator William Smith	none	Grades are written down both on paper and sent electronic.
X	Witness My wife	none	My wife saw me play on my personal devices. She wrote on paper.
X	Witness Daughter	none	My daughter saw me playing video games, and she wrote it on paper.

As a student, one problem that really puzzles me is the lack of improvement in my grades.At first, I was not sure of what the cause was. But as I studied the probable causes one by one. I began to realize the things that were causing my problem.

Quantitative information is crucial to building awareness and gathering support for issues. Hard data analysis provides a concrete approach for assessing, planning, and implementing community projects. It can be a valuable tool in comparing problems across periods of time.

Many of us hate doing research. You, too, have found yourself staring at pages of figures and equations and decided it was a good day for a root canal. The advantages of having this information at your fingertips, however, are enormous. We think it is really a worthwhile task, for many reasons. Some of the best include:

• Knowledge. Reality talks. Knowing the facts is a stark way of determining the size of the gap between your vision of a healthy community and the reality in which you live. Gathering information from the time before your organization got started (also known as baseline data) is an excellent way to show the magnitude of the problem.
• Credibility counts. If you can talk easily in a casual conversation about the exact numbers of people affected by the issue you are involved in, you come across as knowledgeable, serious, and well organized. Writing down those same figures (in greater detail, of course) as part of a grant application or project summary for potential funders and evaluators says that you are a well-run group who can get the job done.
• Awareness leads to change. You can use the statistics you have found to raise community awareness of a number of things: how serious the problem is, how well (or how poorly) your community is doing in relation to other communities or to the nation, and finally: how well your coalition is attacking the problem.

1. Agree on the value and purpose of the information that you will collect

As we have said, we think there are a lot of excellent, general reasons to have the facts about your issue at your fingertips. But why, exactly, does your group need this information? How will you use it?

2. Determine when you want to use this data

Another major decision you need to make is when is this data important. This is really two decisions:

• For what period do you want to find information? Often, it is helpful to look for information either right now, or from the time when your coalition first got started. This latter information, sometimes known as baseline data, tells the scope of the problem before you started work. Later, in the lifespan of your coalition, you can track how things have changed, and determine how effective you have been.

3. Determine exactly what you want to know

What, exactly, do you want to know? Are you just looking for statistics, or do you want to collect some qualitative information?

4. Determine who will find the information Will it be you? A staff member? A volunteer? Do you want one person to focus on collecting the data, or do you want to have several people working on it? Brainstorm who in your organization has experience in collecting data, and who might be interested in doing so. And do they have enough time to do the job?

5. Identify sources of information There are a lot of unusual places where you can find relevant information, depending on your topic.

6. Set limits as to how much information you want to collect

Too much information will be just as much of a problem as not enough. Decide on the limits of what you are going to collect, or you will just get lost among the stacks of data that have piled up on your desk.

7. Collect the data

If you have done all the preparatory work up to this point, this is the easy part. List the sources of data you have found, both in order of those you think are best and those you think are easiest to find (see the Tools section for an example). Start with those, and then get to work.

8. Identify gaps in your knowledge

After you have finished collecting, it is time to take a hard look at the information you have found. Were you able to determine everything you were looking for, or did you not find some important data?

9. Redo the process to try to fill those gaps or collect your own data

Now that you have identified what information you still need to find, you have two choices. You might have simply missed a crucial information source the first time, so brainstorm with others in your group to see if you can think of any places you missed. However, it is also possible, that the information you want to find just is not out there, in which case it is up to you to collect it.

10. If possible, you might want to compare data

It is good to put the information you have found in context, either positive or negative.

Quantitative research methodology usually requires a large sample size. Quantitative research method involvesstructured questionnaire withclose ended questions. It leads to limited outcomes outlined in the research proposal. So, the results cannot always represent the actual occurring, in a generalized form. Quantitative research is difficult and requires a lot of time to be perform the analysis. This type of research is planned carefully to ensure complete randomization and correct designation.

Quantitative research is a lot more complex for social sciences, education, anthropology, and psychology. Effective response should depend on the research problem rather than just a simple yes or no.

Advantage of quantitative research is objectivity and accuracy: Few variables are involved as data relates to close ended information.

And the other advantage of quantitative methods is that they can provide vital information.

Data collection methods are important, because how the information collected is used and what explanations it can generate are determined by the methodology and analytical approach applied by the researcher.

Some of the popular methods of data collection are as follows:

1. Observation:

Observation method has occupied a prominent place in descriptive sociological research. It is the most significant and common technique of data collection. Analysis of questionnaire responses is concerned with what people think and do as reveal by what they put on paper. The responses in interview are revealed by what people express in conversation with the interviewer. Observation seeks to ascertain what people think and do by watching them in action as they express themselves in various situations and activities.

Observation is the process in which one or more persons observe what is occurring in some real-life situation and they classify and record pertinent happenings according to some planned schemes. It is used to evaluate the overt behavior of individuals in controlled or uncontrolled situation. It is a method of research which deals with the external behavior of persons in appropriate situations.

2. Interview

Interview as a technique of data collection is extremely popular and extensively used in every field of social research. The interview is, in a sense, an oral questionnaire. Instead of writing the response, the interviewee or subject gives the needed information verbally in a face-to-face relationship. The dynamics of interviewing, however, involves much more than an oral questionnaire.

Interview is more flexible tool than any written inquiry form and permits explanation, adjustment, and variation according to the situation. The observational methods, as we know, are restricted mostly to non-verbal acts. So, these are understandably not so effective in giving information about person's past and private behavior, future actions, attitudes, perceptions, faiths, beliefs thought processes, motivations etc.

3. Schedule

Schedule is one of the very commonly used tools of data collection in scientific investigation. Schedule is very much like questionnaire and there is slight difference between the two as far as their construction is concerned. The main difference between these two is that whereas the schedule is used in direct interview on direct observation and in it the questions are asked and filled by the researcher himself, the questionnaire is mailed to the respondent, who fills it up and returns it to the researcher. Thus, the main difference between them lies in the method of obtaining data.

4. Questionnaire

Questionnaire provides the most speedy and simple technique of gathering data about groups of individuals scattered in a wide and extended field. In this method, a questionnaire form is sent usually by post to the persons concerned, with a request to answer the questions and return the questionnaire.

5. Projective Techniques The psychologists and psychiatrists had first devised projective techniques for the diagnosis and treatment of patients afflicted by emotional disorders. Such techniques are adopted to present a comprehensive profile of the individual's personality structure, his conflicts and complexes and his emotional needs. Adoption of such techniques is not an easy affair. It requires intensive specialized training.

6. Case Study Method

The case study is a form of qualitative analysis involving the incredibly careful and complete observation of a person, a situation, or an institution.