2.7.2: Critical Thinking Questions
- Page ID
- 58288
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Critical Thinking Questions
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Data Type Classification Challenge: A hospital collects the following data about patients: medical record number, diagnosis, body temperature in Fahrenheit, satisfaction rating (1-5 stars), date of birth, physician notes, and X-ray images. For each item, classify it by structure (structured/semi-structured/unstructured), nature (quantitative/qualitative), and level of measurement. Discuss any items that are ambiguous and could be classified multiple ways.
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Data Quality Cost-Benefit: Achieving perfect data quality is theoretically impossible and practically prohibitive. How should an organization decide "how clean is clean enough"? What factors should influence the acceptable level of data quality for different use cases (e.g., marketing analytics vs. medical device data vs. financial reporting)?
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External Data Ethics: A company wants to scrape competitor websites for pricing data, purchase third-party consumer behavior data, and access social media APIs for sentiment analysis. Discuss the ethical and legal considerations for each external data source. When does collecting external data cross ethical boundaries?
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Governance vs. Agility: Data governance frameworks add process and oversight that can slow down analytics teams. A startup argues they can't afford governance — they need to move fast. Counter this argument: what minimum governance practices should even a fast-moving startup implement, and what are the risks of skipping governance entirely.


