Joe Hamm, Public Policy Center, will teach Understanding Quantitative Social Science Research (NRES898) this summer. This course may be a one-time offering, so sign up now if you're interested.
Syllabus
NRES 898.501 Understanding Quantitative Methods in the Social Sciences
Instructor: Joe Hamm, M.A.
Instructor's Office: Hardin Rm. 234
Office Hours: by appointment
Instructor's Email: joe.hamm@hotmail.com
Classroom: Hardin Rm. 207 or 209
Class Meeting Time: Tuesdays and Thursdays, 6-8:30
Course Description: This course will assist students in understanding and critically evaluating quantitative social science research by reading and discussing articles which use quantitative social science methods to answer environmentally relevant questions.
Purpose of the Course: The purpose of this class is to equip natural resources students with the tools needed to be critical and informed consumers of quantitative social science research addressing natural resources issues. This goal will be accomplished through lecture, discussion, and out of class reading and writing assignments. Specifically, each topic will involve a lecture explaining the topic, approximately two articles applying the topic specifically to natural resource issues to be read out of class, and a class discussion of the use of the topic in the articles. Out of class writing assignments will be used to synthesize the class material and demonstrate proficiency.
Importantly, this class will not focus on producing quantitative social science research and students are unlikely to be prepared to conduct it, however this class will provide a good background for students desiring to move on for more “producer†oriented classes.
Attendance/Participation Policy: Because this is a short summer course that strongly emphasizes discussion, attendance is mandatory. As such, please do plan to be in town for the duration of the course. I understand however that things do come up, particularly over the summer, and am willing to work with students who find themselves in extenuating circumstances but please do talk to me as soon as you know you will have a difficulty.
Active participation is worth 40 of your total grade so please ensure you are in class and prepared. Please note that there are not many readings assigned in this course specifically so that you will be able to delve deeper into them. In order for you to get the most from this course, you will need to truly understand what the researchers wanted to do, what they actually did, and any discrepancies between what they found and what they say they found. You may want to consider reading some of the articles twice in order to really understand what happened.
Assessments: In order to assess student progress in the class, we will have two assessments to be completed during the course. A brief explanation of these assignments is below, but they will be discussed in greater detail in class.
1. The first assessment will require students to select three articles of their choice and write single page article summaries of them (due at the beginning of class on the day that we discuss it). These summaries will be read by the instructor and returned to students with comments that will need to be addressed and returned. These articles will be graded as either "satisfactory" or "non-satisfactory" and in order to complete this assessment, students must have three satisfactory responses. In my experience, though people often know some of what they are unclear on in class, there are often other issues that arise when they are required to "step into the fray." The purpose of this assignment is therefore to have students demonstrate their current understanding of the topics as they are being discussed in class and allow the instructor to assess this demonstration and help the student where specific unclarities still exist.
2. The second assessment would require students to write a research proposal of 5-7 pages (due the last day of class) in which they would present a research question about which they are interested and propose a quantitative social science research study to address it. Students will be expected to pay specific attention to the concepts discussed in this course and explain how their study will address them. The central purpose of this assessment is again for the student to demonstrate their understanding of quantitative social science research, however this assignment will allow students to apply what they have learned in more depth, to a question of their own personal interest, and receive detailed feedback. Students are strongly encouraged to use this opportunity to propose a research idea they would actually like to complete.
Grading Policy 200 points are available in this course and will be assigned as follows: the research proposal will be worth 100 points, each satisfactory article summary will be worth 20 points, and active participation is worth the remaining 40 points. If you chose to take the course for a letter grade, they will be assigned as noted below. If you chose to take the course pass/fail, students who complete the course with more than 150 points will receive a pass.
A 200 to 180 points
B 179 to 160 points
C 159 to 140 points
D 139 to 120 points
F 119 to 100 points
ADA Statement - Students with disabilities are encouraged to contact the instructor for a confidential discussion of their individual needs for academic accommodation. It is the policy of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln to provide flexible and individualized accommodation to students with documented disabilities that may affect their ability to fully participate in course activities or to meet course requirements. To receive accommodation services, students must be registered with the Services for Students with Disabilities (SSD) office, 132 Canfield Administration, 472-3787 voice or TTY.
Course Schedule – We will devote two days to each course topic. Day one will be a lecture presenting the concepts to be covered during that topic. This lecture will lay the foundation for students to read the assigned articles before the following class. In the second class, we will discuss the application of the concepts to environmental issues.
I will direct your readings of the articles so that you focus on the aspects that are most important but remember that the purpose of this class is to learn to critically evaluate social science articles. Please try to use what you have learned to evaluate whether you really believe what the authors are presenting as this will be the focus of our class discussions.
Proposed Topics and Readings List (subject to change)
Data: Observable v. Latent; Survey, Objective or Third Party; Validity
Scales: Items v. Scales; Reliability; Factor analyses
Group Differences: T&F Tests; Effect Sizes; Power
Association: Correlation; Regression; Interactions
Models: Path Analysis; Mediation; Moderation