Exam 21: Nursing Research: Data Collection, Processing, and Analysis

A nursing instructor is teaching data analysis in a nursing resource course. Which statement by the nursing instructor is correct?

____________ allow users to surf the Web and find information on nearly anything, although many researchers steer clear of them because of the vast amounts of unsubstantiated information they are likely to uncover.

Data analysis in quantitative studies may allow the researcher to make inferences to a population beyond the sample, as long as the sample was representative of the population. In contrast, generalizing to a larger population is not a goal of qualitative research. Rather, in qualitative research the goals are exploration and deeper understanding of a phenomenon that has not been widely studied.

Web hosts develop new domain suffixes constantly, so although looking at the suffix can be useful, it should not be the sole deciding factor when choosing to trust information.

Making full use of available library resources serves to strengthen information literacy skills, enabling learners to master content and extend their investigations, become more self-directed, and assume greater control over their own learning.

Information literacy is directly related to knowledge generation and lifelong learning.

________ is a type of study in which two groups of people are identified, one with an exposure of interest and another without the exposure. The two groups are followed forward to determine whether the outcome of interest occurs. Groups are defined based on whether they have had an exposure to a particular risk factor.

A nurse researcher is collecting qualitative data. Which research tool would be used to collect data?

_____________ laws in the world of technology are notoriously misunderstood. The same laws that cover physical books, artwork, and other creative material apply in the digital world and violations can lead to prosecution.

A nurses is researching a nursing topic and will include references from alternative medicine research in the literature review. Which database should the nurse use?

Free text (informational data, such as drug dosages administered, resources used, and problems diagnosed) is recorded electronically. Free text is then interpreted and organized by some standardizing principle, either manually or by computer.

A nurse researcher is reviewing health records to determine exposures that could have contributed to the outcome of interest in a group of patients. This is which type of research?

Computers can aid greatly in the storage, tabulation, and retrieval of qualitative data by acting as the equivalent of an electronic filing cabinet. Data analysis can also be aided by simple data management programs, such as Excel, Access, or NVivo, in which a user can categorize data and link categories with key words.