Primary and Secondary Research - Re-Submission

Primary research is research gathered directly from the person conducting the research. This would involve the researcher going out and directly obtaining the information. Primary research could be gathered by interviews, observation, surveys, trials and more. Primary research is a good type of research as you are directly getting the information so you know it's reliable. You can also get more of a sense of what you are researching. If you are speaking to an eye-witness of an event, you might be able to prompt them to remember certain details. A down side of this is that you can source the information is less ways. Rather than go online and see possibly hundreds of articles, you will need to go out and find it yourself. This could be inconvenient and it could cost you money.

To see an example of myself conducting primary research, see this link where I asked a rail commuter what they thought of price increases http://50173581.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/rail-fare-vt-updated.html

Secondary research is researched that has been collected by someone other than yourself. This would involve the researcher looking at existing data and sources including magazine and newspaper articles, online articles, letters, statements and more. Secondary research can be hugely beneficial as you can get a variety of information that you might not be able to get. For example CCTV footage. If you are researching on a past event then you would need secondary data for CCTV as you cannot fake it yourself. The cost is also lower. Getting a book out of the library or looking online won't cost you anything whereas travelling to see someone will. Despite this, you can't always say how accurate or reliable the research is. It might be from a source that doesn't seem that reliable or it might not be entirely accurate.

More on research - http://50173581.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/research.html


I have conducted research for several college assignments such as in my single camera drama, when I conducted secondary research to find out about hostage situations. In my news show assignment I conducted primary research by interviewing a man on the sea defences on Canvey Island. I found both of these methods useful as I liked the variety and both ways were more convenient. It would be harder to interview someone on a hostage situation and it might take time getting the procedure from the police.