POS3713 Midterm 1 Study Guide Questions and Notes from Class POS3713 Midterm 1 Study Guide Questions 1 How do we know what we know a Epistemology how you know what you know b Ways of knowing something i Precedent look at the past ii Deferring to authority look to scholars and scientists iii iv The only thing that stands up time and time again is observation Intuition Common Sense what does your gut say 2 What do political scientists do exactly a Look at relationships between individuals b Why analyze relationships i Want to understand as much of the political world as possible ii Rely on observation iii Design research to collect data c Political scientists develop causal theories about the political world and test them scientifically the scientific method i Create theory ii Form testable hypothesis iii Carry out research to test hypothesis iv Evaluate research v Modification and extension 3 What is the difference between descriptive and causal inference a Causal Inference Learning something about how the world works that we i Unknown causal relation between two or more variables b Descriptive Inference Learning something about the state of the world we didn t know before didn t know before i Unknown fact about a single variable 1 Inference is by definition uncertain 4 Which form of inference are political scientists most interested in a Political scientists are most interested in causal inferences 5 Is the social world deterministic or probabilistic Why do we care about this distinction a Deterministic relationships such that if some cause occurs then the effect will occur with certainty b Probabilistic such that increases in X are associated with increases or decreases in the probability of occurring but those probabilities are not certainties c The world of human interactions consists of probabilistic relationships d Whereas physical laws like Newton s laws of motion are deterministic the e social sciences more closely resemble probabilistic causation like that in Darwin s theory of natural selection In political science there will always be exceptions because human beings are not deterministic robots whose behaviors always conform to lawlike statements 6 What are variables What features do they have a Variable a definable quantity that can take on two or more values b Variables have labels and values i The variable label is a description of what the variable is ii The variable values are the denominations in which the variable occurs 7 What are independent variables How are they related to dependent variables Know how to identify each in a theory or hypothesis a Independent variable X a variable that is theorized to cause variation in the dependent variable Y b The IV causes the DV c Hypothesis Mitt s Romney s 47 Tape caused him not to win IV viewing of the tape i ii DV outcome of the election d Presidential coattails Theory Republicans congressional candidates do better in years when Republicans win presidency IV party of winning presidential candidate i ii DV Republican success 8 What are antecedent and intervening variables Know how to identify each in a theory or hypothesis a X Z Y X causes Z which causes Y b Antecedent X Intervening Z c d Example Labor repression X tends to reduce trust in government Z which in turn tends to increase the chance of a revolution Y e Example Incumbency X tends to give candidates more name recognition Z which tends to increase the chances of winning reelection Y 9 What is a unit of analysis Know how to identify the unit of analysis in a theory or hypothesis a A unit of analysis could be a person a state or a country for example b The unit of analysis is the major entity that is being analyzed in a study It is the what or who that is being studied In social science research typical units of analysis include individuals most common groups social organizations and social artifacts 10 What is covariation Why is it important for science a Covariation correlation b Certain values of X systematically co occurring with values of Y 11 What is a theory Where do they come from How do we evaluate their merit a A theory is a set of variables b Theories come from questions we have about the world around us c Causal theory can be developed via deduction or induction i Deduction ii Induction 1 Theory Empirics 1 Empirics Theory Identify interesting variation in the DV d e Go from specific to general f Learn from previous theory g Formal theory 12 What is the difference between induction and deduction a Induction i Empirics Theory ii Inductive reasoning works the other way moving from specific observations to broader generalizations and theories Informally we sometimes call this a bottom up In inductive reasoning we begin with specific observations and measures begin to detect patterns and regularities formulate some tentative hypotheses that we can explore and finally end up developing some general conclusions or theories b Deduction i Theory Empirics ii Deductive reasoning works from the more general to the more specific Sometimes this is informally called a top down approach We might begin with thinking up a theory about our topic of interest We then narrow that down into more specific hypotheses that we can test 13 What is falsification and what role does it play in science a b c In order to prove a theory true you must prove that it is not false reject the null hypothesis It must be possible in principle to collect and evaluate evidence that permits us to demonstrate that the hypothesis is not consistent with the evidence If the data permit us to reject the null hypothesis then we can infer that our hypothesis is not yet wrong That implies that we continue to use the theory d This implies that all theory is provisional future evidence may lead us to e Put another way there is no number of tests a theory can pass and then accept the null hypothesis become proven f We attempt to find evidence to be able to reject the null hypothesis i We do not find evidence to accept the research hypothesis 14 What are hypotheses and how do they differ from theories Why do we need hypotheses for science What are the requirements of good hypotheses a A hypothesis is an expectation about what we will observe i More specifically it is a statement derived from theory that describes the expected co variation between the values of two or more concepts 1 Positive relationship the values of x and y move in the same direction x goes up and y goes up or x goes down and y goes
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