Outline of Sociology 60		 Practice of Social Research     Fall, 2009

Instructor: Prof. David P. Phillips; 	
TAs: Geoff Fojtasek; Josh Shapiro 
Office Hours and Location: Tue, Thu 8:00am-9:00a.m., Social Science Bldg #472
Contact Information: email: dphillips@ucsd.edu, phone: 534-0482

Requirements: One midterm exam, one final exam, homework exercises, attendance
	      at lectures and section

There will be three weekly lectures and one weekly section.  You are
expected to attend all of these.  Experience shows that most students do
not master the material unless they do so.  To encourage attendance and
a consistent focus on the material, we will distribute grades as follows:

Attendance at lectures and section 	12.5%
Homework Exercises    			12.5%
Midterm Exam           			25.0% (or 0%; your choice)
Final Exam             			50.0% (or 75%; your choice)

You are encouraged to do the homework exercises with one or more study
partners, but of course you cannot collaborate in writing your exams.

Text: Investigating the Social World, by Russell K. Schutt.  All Chapter
readings listed below refer to this book.  If you are strapped for money,
you should be able to get all the information you need (without the
textbook) by assiduously attending class.

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I. Purpose of the Course: To study types of research designs, the errors
associated with these research designs, and methods of estimating and reducing
these errors. [Chapter 1,2]

II. Definition of Error and Description of Two Major Categories of Error
[Chapter 3]

	A. Systematic (Bias)
	B. Nonsystematic (Random)

III. Research studies differ on many different dimensions (listed below),
and different types of studies tend to be associated with different
types of errors.  Major dimensions, study types and their associated
errors will be described and illustrated.

	A. Purposes of the Study [Chapter 1]

		descriptive
		hypothesis-testing
		explanation-providing


	B. Source of the research questions investigated (e.g. from
		professional literature; from publicly important topics;
		from observation) [Chapter 12]


	C. Types of data to be analyzed [Contrast Chapters 7,8]

		qualitative vs quantitative
		small-sample vs large-sample
		richly detailed vs poorly detailed information


	D. Methods of sampling the data [Chapter 4]

		complete counts of the population (e.g. census and vital registration)

		incomplete counts (i.e., sampling)

			nonrandom sampling
				convenience
				snowball
				quota

			random sampling
				simple
				systematic
				stratified
				cluster

			concepts of confidence intervals and statistical
				significance

			Standard Error of a number, percent, average, rate


	E. Methods of collecting the data from the population or sample

		conducting sample surveys

		conducting field studies

		examining social and cultural artifacts (e.g. tv programs,
			news stories, advertisements, websites)

		conducting laboratory experiments [Chapter 6]

		conducting natural experiments [Chapter 6]

		using pre-collected data and archives [Chapter 9]
			(e.g., government statistics and archives)

	F. Types of measurement errors [Chapter 3]

		nominal vs ordinal vs interval vs ratio


	G. Types of inferential errors [Chapter 5]

			inferring characteristics of the population from
				characteristics of the sample it came from

			inferring causal processes from the observations

				failure to identify and correct for bias

				 	common biases, from:

						observer
						interviewer
						analyst
						question wording, order etc.
						journal
						auspices
						time
						respondent
						reader

				failure to correct for key variables

				failure to correct for multiple testing

				failure to stick to analysis appropriate to
					measurement scale (e.g. ordinal)
					unit of analysis (e.g. ecological
						fallacy)

				failure to acknowledge or identify plausible
					alternative explanations for the
					findings


IV. Use of the computer to reduce computational errors and analyze large masses
of information. [Chapter 10]

	How to enter, edit, and read computerized records
	How to use elementary UNIX/Linux omputer utilities to perform simple 
		analyses

		awk
		cat
		cut
		grep
		less
		ls
		pr
		sort
		vi