FIT4005 / FIT5125 Research Methods for IT Semester 1 2024 Assignment 3

Value

This assignment is worth 20% of the total marks for FIT4005 / FIT5125

Assignment due date

Thursday, 9-May-2024 at 4:30pm (Week 10)

Submission method

Submit to Moodle:

· a separate PDF for the exercises for Week 8 & 9.

Assignment Criteria

Telling a coherent story with your data is a core part of the research process. Statistics can be used in myriad ways to describe any given dataset, so it is important to use the appropriate measures and visualisations to enrich and provide context to a narrative of your data. Although in a perfect world we would ask a question and then design a process to capture data that answered that question, in reality we often have to make use of 'secondary' data, or data captured previously.

In this assignment, you will tell a story about some public data using the methods you have learned about.

Complete the following:

1. Identify a data source from one of the following open data repositories:

https://www.data.vic.gov.au/

https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/

https://uis.unesco.org

https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/databrowser/

https://opendata.cityofnewyork.us/

2. Formulate a research question that you want to ask of this data - for example "What is the relationship between the value of imported goods and cost of living?" (max. 50 words)

3. Select 2 appropriate descriptive metrics (e.g. mean) that tell you something about the data, and

calculate those metrics on your selected data, using a tool of your choice. Present the fields from the dataset used and the resulting calculated values (max. 50 words)

4. Create an appropriate visualisation to help a reader understand what you are saying about the data. The visualisation should be fully annotated.

5. Write a short narrative description of your findings as they relate to you research question, referencing both your chosen metrics and visualisation. (max. 150 words)

In this exercise you will formulate a hypothesis, prepare a plan of your study (including statistical testing) and justify it, including the potential limitations of it. Consider the topic of the survey that you participated in during the unit. Imagine you are asked to develop this research area further.

Complete the following:

1. Propose a hypothesis. It should be something you can realistically test using one or more of the

statistical tests covered in this course. It can concern any topic or natural phenomena which relates in some way to the survey topic. (max. 50 words)

2. Write down the null hypothesis. (max. 50 words)

3. Write down the independent and dependent variables as well as at least three confounding variables.

(max. 50 words)

4. Imagine you had a budget of up to 1000AUD (in addition to up to 100 hours of your time to conduct the study). Explain what data you will collect to investigate this hypothesis and how you would obtain the data in a practical fashion. (max. 100 words)

5. What statistical test(s) do you expect to conduct to test your hypothesis. Provide your assumptions of the data and why such tets(s) are appropriate. (max. 150 words)

6. What are the limitations of your study? Write a paragraph that explains these limitations as well as potential future investigations you might conduct. (max. 200 words)

7. Present a different narrative that could have been presented from your results, highlighting how the data needs to be selected, methods changed, or process otherwise manipulated to support this different interpretation. (max. 50 words)