Nominal Data Definition Characteristics How To Analyze

Nominal Data Definition

Characteristics

No Quantity can be Assigned to it – We cannot assign any quantitative aspect to nominal data. It will always be in the form of nomenclature where statistical, logical, and numerical analysis is impossible, which means the researcher cannot perform any addition, subtraction, or multiplication with the data.No Order Present – This data has no specific order present, as when we deal with data like gender, marital status, and demography, it doesn’t matter how we look at these data.Qualitative Aspect – This data collected will always have this qualitative feature where the options provided for answering the questionnaires are qualitative in their attribute.Mean calculation not Possible – We cannot calculate the mean when we deal with nominal data. Even if the data set arrange alphabetically, calculation of meanCalculation Of MeanMean refers to the mathematical average calculated for two or more values. There are primarily two ways: arithmetic mean, where all the numbers are added and divided by their weight, and in geometric mean, we multiply the numbers together, take the Nth root and subtract it with one.read more is impossible.Mode Calculation Possibility – The most common answer for this data submitted from a large group of respondents is the mode. If a majority of the respondents provide any one kind of answer for a particular question, that particular answer is assumed to be the mode of the study.Data mostly in the Alphabetical Format – In most cases for nominal data, the data is primarily in alphabetical order and not numerical.

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Example of Nominal Data

Here, we have taken an example of 3 college students studying at a university and having their aggregate marks studied for three consecutive trimesters. Here the data collected are alphabetical or text, and we cannot assign any calculation. However, we can group the data in excel to arrive at the aggregate of the marks by finding the average of each number assigned to the unique text fields.

How to Analyze Nominal Data?

Nominal data are generally collected using questions that respondents must answer. Questionnaires provided to the respondents include questions that can be either open-ended or multiple-choice based, where there are many options to choose from.So basically, there are three ways to collect the data. First, an open-ended question, second multiple-choice question, and third a part of the multiple-choice question where the respondents will choose a different category as “others.” It means the closest answer choice is not present in the list of options given. Thus, the respondent chooses “Other” and mentions the answers as an open-ended type.This data is then analyzed using percentage and mode, which means out of all the responses gathered for a question, the most common answer is the option the majority of the respondents have chosen. It becomes the model of the study.There can be more than one modal response for a specific question if there are two options or answers that share an equal percentage or choice over the others. Multiple choice questions help the researcher with the ability to create a metric variable that they can use in further studies.Nominal data can help the researcher create a profile of their respondents, which may not help in statistical studies but can help the researcher get a deeper understanding of their respondents.

Advantages

It offers the freedom to respondents to freely express their opinion.The research is easy to conduct when there are close-ended questions.One can collect a large number of answers to questions very quickly.It has increased reliability as it is solely dependent on the choice of answers made by the respondents.It is not time-consuming and can be done by anyone with minimum expertise.It is also cost-effective as only what is needed is a set of questions and a questionnaire.

Conclusion

Nominal data is a beneficial method used by researchers to collect their survey responses and use them in their study. It is cost-effective and not a time-consuming process. In addition, from the respondent’s point of view, it offers greater flexibility to make their choices and answer the questionnaire.