The Results Chapter: The Art of Reporting Without Interpreting (2026 Guide)

If Chapter 3 was the recipe, Chapter 4 is the meal.

You have collected your surveys. You have transcribed your interviews. You have run your SPSS or SmartPLS analysis. Now, you have pages and pages of numbers and quotes.

What do you do with them?

Most postgraduate students in Malaysia make a fatal error here. They get excited. They see a significant P-value (0.000) and immediately start writing: “This proves that Malaysian SMEs love digital marketing because…”

Stop.

That sentence belongs in Chapter 5.

In Chapter 4, you are not a Scientist explaining “Why.” You are a News Reporter stating “What.”

• Reporter (Chapter 4): “The score was 5-0.”
• Commentator (Chapter 5): “The score was 5-0 because the defense was weak.”

If you mix these two roles, your thesis becomes repetitive, messy, and technically incorrect. Examiners hate reading the same explanation twice.

This guide will teach you exactly how to write a clean, professional Results Chapter that reports the facts—and nothing but the facts.

1. The “Golden Rule”: Just the Facts, Ma’am

The absolute most important rule for Chapter 4 is: Do not interpret.

What is Interpretation?

Interpretation is when you explain the reason behind a number, or connect it to previous studies.

• Bad (Interpretation): “Table 4.1 shows that 60% of respondents are male. This is likely because the engineering industry is male-dominated, as noted by Ali (2020).”
• Good (Reporting): “As shown in Table 4.1, the majority of respondents were male (60%), while females constituted 40%.”

Why this matters:

• Chapter 4 answers “What did you find?”
• Chapter 5 answers “So what does it mean?”

Keep them separate. In Chapter 4, pretend you have no opinion. You are just a machine printing out the data.

2. Structure for Quantitative Studies (SPSS / PLS-SEM)

For a standard quantitative thesis (e.g., MBA, MSc in Management), Chapter 4 follows a strict, predictable sequence. Do not deviate from this.

A. Response Rate

Start by telling the examiner how many people you asked vs. how many answered.

• “A total of 500 questionnaires were distributed. Of these, 420 were returned, yielding a response rate of 84%. After data cleaning (removing incomplete forms), 384 usable responses remained.”

B. Demographic Profile

Who are these people?

• Present a table of Gender, Age, Income, Education.
• Writing Tip: Do not describe every single number. Just highlight the Dominant Group.
  • Example: “Most respondents held a Bachelor’s Degree (45%), followed by Diploma holders (30%).”

C. Normality and Reliability (The “Health Check”)

Before you test your hypothesis, you must prove your data is healthy.

• Normality: Report Skewness and Kurtosis values (usually between -1 and +1). If you used SmartPLS, justify why non-normality is acceptable.
• Reliability: Report Cronbach’s Alpha. It must be > 0.7. If it is 0.69, do not hide it. Explain it.

D. Descriptive Statistics

Report the Mean (Average) and Standard Deviation (Spread) for your variables.

• “The variable ‘Customer Satisfaction’ had the highest mean (M=4.20, SD=0.85), indicating that respondents generally felt satisfied.”

E. Inferential Statistics (The Climax)

This is the Hypothesis Testing (Correlation / Regression).

• The Rule: State the Result, the Beta Value (Strength), and the P-Value (Significance).
• Example: “H1 proposed a relationship between Price and Satisfaction. The results indicate a significant positive relationship ($\beta=0.45$, $p < 0.001$). Therefore, H1 is supported.”
• Stop there. Do not say “This is because price is important…” Save that for Chapter 5.

3. Structure for Qualitative Studies (Thematic Analysis)

If you did interviews, Chapter 4 is harder. You don’t have tables of numbers; you have words. Your job is to organize these words into Themes.

A. Participant Profiles

Give your participants pseudonyms (e.g., “Informant A,” “Manager 1”).

• Create a table showing their background (Years of Experience, Job Title) to prove they are experts.

B. Thematic Analysis (The Core)

Structure this section by Research Question or by Theme.

• Theme 1: Financial Barriers
  • Start with the finding: “Most participants (8 out of 10) identified high costs as the primary barrier.”
  • Provide Evidence (The Quote): “Informant A stated: ‘We simply cannot afford the RM50,000 license fee. It is too much for a small company.’“
  • Reinforce: “Similarly, Informant C mentioned that cash flow issues prevent adoption.”

The Trap:

Do not just dump long quotes. A quote should never stand alone. It must be “sandwiched” between your introduction and your summary of what the quote means.

4. The “Table Dump” Mistake

This is a classic formatting error.

The Mistake:

Copying and pasting the raw output from SPSS or SmartPLS directly into the Word document.

• These tables are ugly. They have weird borders. They contain useless columns (like “f-value” or “Sum of Squares”) that nobody reads.

The Fix:

You must re-type the data into a clean, APA-style table.

• APA Table Rules: No vertical lines. Only horizontal lines at the top, bottom, and under headings.
• Remove any column that you do not discuss in the text. If it’s not relevant, cut it.

5. Handling “Non-Significant” Results

What if your hypothesis failed?

• Scenario: You predicted that “Training” improves “Performance.” The data says P = 0.45 (Not Significant).

Do not panic. And definitely do not change the data.

• In Chapter 4, just report it honestly: “The relationship between Training and Performance was not statistically significant ($\beta=0.05$, $p > 0.05$). Thus, H3 is rejected.”

A rejected hypothesis is still a “Finding.” In fact, it is often more interesting. In Chapter 5, you will explain why it failed (maybe the training was bad? Maybe the employees didn’t care?). That is where the A+ grade comes from.

6. Visualizing the Data

Examiners are skimming readers. Help them.

• Bar Charts: Good for demographics (e.g., comparing Male vs Female).
• Structural Model (PLS-SEM): You MUST include the diagram from SmartPLS showing the path coefficients (the arrows with numbers on them).
• Word Clouds (Qualitative): Can be a nice visual to show the most common words used by participants, but don’t rely on it as “proof.”

Summary Checklist

Before you send Chapter 4 to your supervisor, check this:

1. Did I interpret anything? (Scan for words like “because,” “implies,” “suggests.” Move those sentences to Chapter 5).
2. Are my tables APA formatted? (No vertical lines).
3. Did I report the “Health Check”? (Normality and Reliability come before Regression).
4. Is the P-value accurate? (If SPSS says .000, write $p < 0.001$, not $p = 0.000$).
5. For Qual: Did I use pseudonyms to protect privacy?

If you follow these rules, your Chapter 4 will be boring—and that is exactly what it should be. Boring, accurate, and undeniable.

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