<P> Gathering data can be accomplished through a primary source (the researcher is the first person to obtain the data) or a secondary source (the researcher obtains the data that has already been collected by other sources, such as data disseminated in a scientific journal). Data analysis methodologies vary and include data triangulation and data percolation . The latter offers an articulate method of collecting, classifying and analyzing data using five possible angles of analysis (at least three) in order to maximize the research's objectivity and permit an understanding of the phenomena under investigation as complete as possible: qualitative and quantitative methods, literature reviews (including scholarly articles), interviews with experts, and computer simulation . The data are thereafter "percolated" using a series of pre-determined steps so as to extract the most relevant information . </P> <P> Though data is also increasingly used in other fields, it has been suggested that the highly interpretive nature of them might be at odds with the ethos of data as "given". Peter Checkland introduced the term capta (from the Latin capere, "to take") to distinguish between an immense number of possible data and a sub-set of them, to which attention is oriented . Johanna Drucker has argued that since the humanities affirm knowledge production as "situated, partial, and constitutive," using data may introduce assumptions that are counterproductive, for example that phenomena are discrete or are observer - independent . The term capta, which emphasizes the act of observation as constitutive, is offered as an alternative to data for visual representations in the humanities . </P>

Data is made up by many pieces of information