Big Data and Doctoral Research: Opportunities, Challenges, and Cautions

Abstract

This chapter explores opportunities and challenges that are presented to doctoral candidates (and indeed all researchers) through access to big data. The authors consider what big data is and what it is not, and how working with big data differs from traditional research design and analysis. They provide examples of the opportunities that big data offers in terms of the combination of diverse data sets, sources, and types and how it can provide new perspectives on inter-disciplinary challenges. They also highlight some of the challenges for the use of big data, both for the individual researcher and for institutions. The authors advocate for the need to embrace these challenges but without foregoing data integrity and the expert use and interpretation of data.