Data handling

Method: I will record my results in a number of ways. The techniques that I will use for recording the data I collect are

• Histograms, with unequal intervals- they are good for good for more than one set of information
• Simple graphs for a quick understanding of data
• Stem and leaf diagrams- a quick, simple way of tallying incoming information
• Pie charts because they are easy to read and give a good understanding of the percentages of data.

Preliminarily I will use one newspaper. I will record the amount of space devoted to each item using square centimeters. I will record the areas for:

• The title
• articles on sport
• The date
• House articles
• Television articles
• Nature topics
• Public affairs

I will collect data for three different newspapers, taking and reviewing five pages from assorted parts of the newspaper [sport page, house page etc.] The three newspapers will be the Sun, the Daily Mail and the Henley Standard. I will compare the data of each newspaper with the results for the others and use standard deviation to see which has the largest spread. That is what I will do to achieve my aims. Finally I will write about my discoveries, saying which newspaper had the most amounts of sport articles etc.

Problems: If there are any outliers in this coursework they will be removed. If a certain item does not fit into any of the categories, it will be removed. There are very few problems that could happen. If another unexpected problem happens, I will find a way around it. For example, if an article fits into two subjects I will find which it fits best into and put it under that subject.

Accuracy: My results will be very accurate. I will record the length and width of articles to the nearest millimeter. My graphs and histograms diagrams etc will also be as equally accurate. I will also when conducting standard deviation go to the nearest milimetre degree of accuracy.