Competencies and dispositions for exploring micro data with digital tools
Daniel Frischemeier, Rolf Biehler, Joachim Engel · 2016
Exploring micro data requires the ability to use digital tools for managing large multivariate data. Digital tools allow changing easily between different uni- and multivariate displays and summary statistics for a deeper insight into the data. In this paper we examine the suitability of several digital data analysis tools for exploring a large, multivariate socio-economic dataset, ranging from educational tools (TinkerPlots, Fathom) to professional software (R). Based on German income structure data, we will point out benefits and limitations of TinkerPlots, Fathom and R for comparing groups, investigating subgroups, analyzing relationships between variables and for exploring multivariate phenomena.