Many of us are familiar with creating and distributing paper surveys, but managing all of that paper can be a daunting process. Using Google Forms will allow you to create an electronic version of the same survey that can be completed on any device that has access to the internet. Using Forms is easy, allowing you time to focus on results rather than complex issues of distribution and collection.

Here are some of the ways that Google Forms makes it easy to collect and work with your research data: google forms gives you immediate access to the data that you collect; as forms are submitted, the data is instantly compiled into a single spreadsheet, saving you the hassle of entering the results by hand; the data that you collect is also easy to quickly graph; best of all Google Spreadsheets makes it easy to access your data from any computer and collaborate with others when you need help.

Careful and measured data analysis is an important part of the research process. With that in mind, it's also important to have a sense of what the data is saying at a glance. Google Spreadsheets gives you the flexibility to survey a population about a topic and immediately transfer that information into a spreadsheet. Instant results means being able to skip the steps of scoring results, inputting them in a spreadsheet, and doing calculations by hand. While those skills are essential to learn and cultivate, it's easy to feel lost in a sea of procedural steps before you see any results. Using Spreadsheets allows you to talk about the data you've collected immediately, explore questions around what might be missing or inconsistant, giving you more time to devote to the process of data analysis.

Google Spreadsheets gives you a variety of options for downloading your data once you've collected it. You can pull your data as a CSV (Comma Separated Value), HTML, Text, Excel, OpenOffice, or a PDF. This gives you the flexibility to go back to Excel or SPSS, if that's where you're comfortable working with data, if you would rather not use Google Spreadsheets. 

Once you understand how Spreadsheets organizes data, it's easy to create graphs that updates in real time. Real time graphs give you a tool that allows you to create visual representations of trends or attitudes. Reading charts and graphs is an important part of interpreting quantitative data, and this gives you an avenu for reinforcing that skill set. 

Spreadsheets are a tremendously powerful tool. Hands down. The problem is that learning to use them well can be an intimidating process. One of the wonderful things about a spreadsheet is that values in cells can be referenced in other cells or on other pages. This means that results and calculations can be deeply connected to one another. It also means that a single data set can be used for multiple purposes without needing to be copied or altered. 

The real benefit of a Google Spreadsheet over an Excel spreadsheet comes in the form of real time collaboration and manipulation. Instead of trading a single file back and forth with multiple versions, users access a single document that behaves in the same way on a PC and on a Mac. You always have access to the most recent version of the document, and you can track the revisions of a document over time. Additionally, you have the ability to lock portions of the spreadsheet if you need to protect your raw data. Locked pages in a spreadsheet can still be referenced with formulas on other pages.