A Study on Role of Data Mining in Research Methodology

The term “Research” pertains to a “Search of facts”. It is the process which includes defining and redefining problems, formulating hypothesis, collecting, organizing and evaluating data; making deductions and reaching conclusions and at last presenting it in a detailed, accurate manner. Research Methodology is a way to systematically solve the research problem by logically adopting various steps to refer the logic behind the research process. The main aim of research is to find out the hidden truth and Information Technology provides such useful tools to make this research process easier, accurate and reliable. Data Mining is one such tool in researcher’s tool bag which facilitates the research process. Data Mining and Knowledge Discovery in Databases (KDD) are rapidly evolving areas of research that are at the intersection of several disciplines, including statistics, databases, pattern recognition and optimization. The term data mining has been mostly used by statisticians, data analysts, and database communities and also by the researchers. This paper mainly focuses on concepts of data mining such as Classification, Clustering, Regression, Association, Estimation and Prediction that help the researchers in the areas of research process such as Literature Review, Collection, Analysis, Interpretation and Representation of data. Present study also concentrates on role of data mining in research methodology to reveal patterns and relationships from the piles of data using the software’s like CART, SPSS, and MATLAB etc.