(F) Discrete and continuous data

Question 1

What is discrete data?

Answer 1

data that is counted and only takes certain values

the units of measurement can’t be split up

Question 2

What is continuous data?

Answer 2

data that is measured and takes any value within a range

can be shown on a number line

all the points have meaning and are different

Question 3

What discrete data did we collect?

Answer 3

• likert survey
• questionnaire
• bi-polar survey
• photos/field sketches

Question 4

What continuous data could you collect?

Answer 4

• water level in a river
• amount of rainfall
• temperature
• amount of snowfall

Question 5

What did we do for the likert survey?

Answer 5

• 4 statements
• strongly disagree to strongly agree
• asked people

Question 6

What did we do for the bi-polar survey?

Answer 6

• 5 statements
• -3 to +3
• compared sites

Question 7

What did we do for the questionnaire?

Answer 7

• 3 questions
• yes/no answers
• some longer statements

Question 8

What did we do for the photographs and field sketches?

Answer 8

• took photos of the sites
• annotated them
• pencil sketch of the site
• general shape then details
• annotated them

Question 9

What did we do for the environmental quality survey?

Answer 9

• scored sites from 0-10
• six categories
• higher was better

Question 10

What did we do for crowdsourcing?

Answer 10

• searched for images of the ‘river ecclesbourne flooding’

- took top 50 images

Question 11

What did we do for the newspaper articles?

Answer 11

• read articles about flooding

- collected data about the river

Question 12

What are the advantages and disadvantages of the likert survey?

How can it be improved?

Answer 12

• gather opinions in an organised way
• data can be analysed
• people may not answer honestly
• researcher bias affects who’s asked
• print slips with Qs on for people to fill in
• they don’t have to share opinion in public

Question 13

What are the advantages and disadvantages of the bi-polar survey?

How can it be improved?

Answer 13

-allows us to compare sites

• isn’t a reliable scale
• some criteria are hard to judge
• use a bigger scale
• use criteria that are easier to judge

Question 14

What are the advantages and disadvantages of the questionnaire?

How can it be improved?

Answer 14

• allows us to ask our own questions
• can collect individual responses
• not everyone/all groups responded
• not a lot of people to ask
• ask more people
• use stratified sampling

Question 15

What are the advantages and disadvantages of the photos/field sketches?

How can it be improved?

Answer 15

• remind us of the site
• photos capture more detail than we can draw
• sketch shows important features clearer
• only shows time of year/day
• can’t always be drawn accurately
• can be difficult to interpret
• going back at other times to collect a range of data
• drawing from a photo so that it is easier to see
• collect photos of other conditions

Question 16

What are the advantages and disadvantages of the environmental quality survey?

How can it be improved?

Answer 16

• total scores let us compare sites against each other
• overall representation of the environment of the sites
• depends on the day
• judged by opinion
• sometimes difficult to judge
• use a wider scoring range
• use more than one survey to gain an average

Question 17

What are the advantages and disadvantages of crowdsourcing?

How can it be improved?

Answer 17

• gives a wide range of data
• gives past data
• gives data from different conditions
• some images could be altered/unreliable
• images of a different place
• don’t provied accurate dates
• check where they were taken
• use images from reliable sources
• use less images

Question 18

What are the advantages and disadvantages of the newspaper articles?

How can it be improved?

Answer 18

• data already collected
• easy to access
• don’t know how it was collected
• may be inaccurate/biased
• use multiple articles/sources
• use past articles