Poster #39 - Making Data Useful: A Longitudinal Examination of Young Adults' Developing Data Transformation Processes

• In Event: 18.060 - MTCC Poster Session Two
  In Poster Session: 18.060-5 - Advanced Technologies for Learning Poster Session

Abstract

Advances in computing have changed what it means to work with quantitative data across the disciplines. Increasingly, data are not constructed by investigators themselves, but are sourced from research partners, open repositories, simulations, or automated sensors. Learning to select and transform these datasets to align with one’s own investigative goals is a critical, yet understudied, feature of working with data. In this study, we examine how teens and young adults learn over the course of three repeated interviews to transform existing datasets to make them more useful for their own questions and investigations. We ask: How do novices’ (1) engagement in the process of data transformation, and (2) selection and execution of particular data moves, develop with time and experience?

Authors

• Michelle Hoda Wilkerson, University of California - Berkeley

• Kathryn Lanouette, University of California - Berkeley