PSC 202 1st EditionExam # 1 Study Guide Lectures: 2 - 11Lecture 2 (January 14) I. Evolution of the study of politics- politics:1. a clash of ideas, interests and values striving for dominance+ Lasswell: process of determining “who gets what, where, and when”- a very brief history:1. political science has become less descriptive and more explanatory2. it has also become less normative and more analyticalII. The scientific method and political science- Science1. scientific method: the identification and testing of empirical and normative methods- normative vs. empirical1. normative: a statement that expresses judgment or belief about what ought to be2. empirical: a statement that can be confirmed or proved false through observation - some key steps1. formulate strong research question2. propse an explanation; hypotheses3. data collection process4. use data to evaluate hypotheses5. reassess explanation - if a test proves hypotheses correct, explanations turn into theories- political science1. the application of the scientific enterprise to the study of politics and governmentIII. The discipline today- main subfields1. political theory + examines conceptsmore room for normative claims in some branches2. comparative politics+ politics outside US+comparisons between countries3. American politics+refers to the United Statessome say should include all of the Americas 4. International relations+interaction of countriesIV. Developing a research question- five criteria for good research questions1. clarity+ must be specific enough to give direction to the research2. testability+ must be answered by empirical inquirymust be answered given the resources available3. theoretical significance+should potentially increase our knowledge and understanding of the topic+something someone would care about4. practical relevance+should have use for citizens5. originality- major steps1. finding a good research question2. identifying, classifying, and explaining existing scholarly answers3. preparing research design and data collection4. analyzing the data5. recording the results- good topics are… 1. interesting to you and the reader2. important3. puzzling4. short and directLecture 3 (January 21)I. Concepts- mental constructs to represent real-world phenomena 1. in debates about values, concepts ca evoke powerful feelings of identity2. in empirical political science, concepts refer to facts, not values (political scientists use “freedom” or “equality” to describe characteristics in the real world)- identifying the relationship between concepts is at the core of science - acquiring knowledge requires labeling and describing- conceptual questions are difficult to answer empirically- concrete question: question that can be answered empirically- observation always presupposes at least a rudimentary conception of what the answer should be- concepts need to be transformed into concrete questions in such a way that they canbe described and analyzed- a conceptual definition describes clearly the concept’s measureable properties and specifies the units of analysis to which the concept applies II. The measurement process- concept precise definition of conceptmeasurement strategyvariable- an operational definition describes the instrument to be used in measuring the concept an putting a conceptual definition “into operation” - variable: a measure of a concept.- Variables have units and can take on one of at least two values- to define a concept: clarify its empirical meaning by making inventory of its empiricalproperties 1. 3 problems: 1) we might think of empirical properties that refer to a different concept, 2)the inventory may include conceptual terms, 3) the empirical properties may represent different dimensions of the concept2. we cannot use one concept to define anotherIII. Measurement issues - measurement error:1. systematic error: the measurement tool consistently mismeasures what we want it to measure2. Random error: the measurement tool produces errors that are unpredictable anderratic- Reliability: extent to which a measurement tool measures a concept consistently- Validity: extent to which a measurement tool measures the intended concept with accuracyLecture 4 (January 26)I. Variable types (Measurement Levels)- Variable: an empirical measurement of a characteristic1. provide raw materials for describing and analyzing the social and political world2. every variable has one name and at least two values- Nominal level variable: communicates differences between units of analysis on the characteristic being measured1. least precise2. values and codes of a nominal variable simply indentify the differences between results- they are number-labels, not quantities- Ordinal level variable: communicates relative differences between units of analysis 1. have values that can be ranked2. used to measure attitudes3. values permit you to distinguish the relative amount of the character being measured- interval level variable: communicates exact differences between units of analysis 1. highest level of measurement2. allow researcher to place units of analysis into different categories and they permit units to be ranked on the measured characteristic plus gauge fine differences between units of analysis- index (summative scale, ordinal scale): an additive combination of ordinal variables, each of which is coded identically, and all of which are measures of the same concept- Likert scale: additive index of 5 or 7 value ordinals each of which captures the strength and direction of agreement with a declarative statementII. Distributions - Distribution: The relative frequencies of the different values of a variable in some sample of cases. Often depicted in a histogram or density plot.- Frequency distribution: a tabular summary of a variable’s valuesIII. Central tendency and dispersion- Central tendency: a variable’s typical or average value- Mode: the value that contains the largest number of cases or units of analysis- Median: the value of a variable that divides the cases right down the middle- Nominal Variables ➪ Mode- Ordinal Variables ➪ Mode, Median- Interval Variables ➪ Mode, Median & Mean- Dispersion: the variation or spread of cases across a political variable’s values- Raw frequency: number of individuals giving each response- Total frequency: total of raw frequencies- Percentage for each value: (raw frequency/total frequency)x100- Cumulative percentage: