exam prep

Question 1

ontology

Answer 1

nature of the social world

Question 2

epistemology

Answer 2

what can we know about social phonomena

Question 3

does positivism use induction or deduction?

Answer 3

induction
observation => theory

Question 4

does logical positivism use induction or deduction?

Answer 4

deduction
theory => observation

Question 5

abduction: what is it? which approach?

Answer 5

abduction is selecting the most simple explanation that best explains something, and is used by scientific realism.

Question 6

analytic review

Answer 6

1. summarize
2. evaluate
3. conceptualize

Question 7

grounded theory process

Answer 7

1. coding
2. sorting
3. memo writing

Question 8

key elements of causality

Answer 8

1. non spurious
2. temporal ordering
3. spatial and temporal contiguity
4. covariance

Question 9

measurement validity - content validity

Answer 9

does the conceptualization and operationalization match, does the concept cover what it’s. necessary for the theoretical definition?

Question 10

measurement validity - criterion/ construct validity

Answer 10

does the measurement actually measure what it seeks to measure?

Question 11

convergent validity

Answer 11

how closely a test is related to other tests that measure the same (or similar) constructs.

Question 12

concurrent validity

Answer 12

does it correlate with something that’s happening at the same time?

Question 13

challenges of selection

5

Answer 13

1. selection bias
2. outliers
3. non-equal size: heterogeneity
4. historical contingency (joint history)
5. path dependency (stable trends)

Question 14

rolling cross section (longtidunial)

Answer 14

dynamic changes and trends 1 huge sample divided into groups, and interviewed at different times

Question 15

methodological issues in surveys (3)

Answer 15

1. surveys usually focus on predicting, rather than explaining
2. surveys cannot identify causation, but can only imply causation. However, in panel studies making causal explanations is more possible.
3. It’s important to not make inferences accross levels. For example, “individualistic fallacy” is generalizing from the micro (individual) level to the macro (group, general) level, and “ecological fallacy” is making inferences from the macro (group, general) level to the micro (individual) level. These types of fallacies should be considered while conducting survey research.

Question 16

solutions to methodological issues in surveys (4)

Answer 16

1. randomizing questions
2. writing balanced questions (like giving both pro and con statements)
3. pre-testing (to see if questions are easy to understand)
4. monitoring and verifying to see if there’s problems

Question 17

types of probability sampling (3)

Answer 17

1. simple random sampling
2. strafied sampling
3. multistage cluster

Question 18

types of non probability sampling (4)

Answer 18

1. convenience
2. snowball
3. theoretical
4. purposive

Question 19

types of response biases (2)

Answer 19

self selection
non response

Question 20

conditions of probability sampling (3)

Answer 20

1. every unit has equal chance of being chosen
2. an observer can’t predict which units will be chosen
3. sample must include all possible combinations of units

Question 21

difference between stratified random sampling and systematic random sampling?

Answer 21

• In systematic sampling, the list of elements is “counted off”. That is, every kth element is taken.
• Stratified sampling also divides the population into groups called strata. However, this time it is by some characteristic.

Question 22

multistage cluster sampling

Answer 22

random sampling in several stages from big to small.

Question 23

is quota sampling probabilistic, or not probabilistic?

Answer 23

not probabilistic

Question 24

quota sampling

Answer 24

having quotas of subgroups so you can compare them
(but doesn’t represent the actual distribution)

• if the quota is ARBITRARY and DOESN’T REFLECT REALITY => NOT STRATIFIED
• if quota is REPRESENTATIVE and REFLECTS REALITY => STRATIFIED

Question 25

three types of comparative historical analysis

Answer 25

1. parallel demonstration of theory 2. contrast of contexts 3. macro causal analysis

Question 26

the article by ulriksen and dadaulari is an example of

Answer 26

indepth process tracing and single case study for theory testing.

Question 27

influential cases are used for..

Answer 27

theory testing (influential cases should confirm a theory)

Question 28

pathway case selection

Answer 28

cases that allow the researcher to isolate certain causal mechanisms- to prove that this and nothing else leads to the effect.

Question 29

difference between cohort and panel

Answer 29

in a panel study, random selection is done once, and we can track individual-level changes, and control for the differences that may occur within different samples. in a cohort study, the researcher does random selection multiple times in different time periods. This alllows the researcher to observe changes at the aggregate level. in a cohort study, you can see how age affects certain variables, or if a critical event influenced all segments of the sample, or if attitudes are tied to specific birth cohorts like milennials etc.

Question 30

when is qualitative comparative analysis useful?

Answer 30

medium to large n comparative research - too many cases to study in depth, but not enough cases to study qualitatively

Question 31

what's data reduction?

Answer 31

related to: semi/un-structured interviews: systematically summarizing and interpreting responses

Question 32

assumptions of experiments

Answer 32

1. same unit different treatment (counterfactual-unit homogeneity) 2. conditional independence (iv is independent of dv) - no endogeneity, yes exogeneity - no selection bias - no omitted variable bias

Question 33

what's matching? (under random assignment)

Answer 33

random assignment that's sensitive to the demographics of participants

Question 34

solomon four group design

Answer 34

four groups: 2 pretest- posttest 2 posttest only => to both verify that random asignment was able to create equivalent groups while having the advantage of posstest only.

Question 35

what's the interaction effect examined in mintz?

Answer 35

participants x certainty

Question 36

syntactical unit of content

Answer 36

words, sentences, paragraphs

Question 37

referential unit of content

Answer 37

events, people

Question 38

thematic unit of content

Answer 38

topics

Question 39

3 V's of big data

Answer 39

volume velocity variety

Question 40

data mining

Answer 40

focusing on data correlations instead of theory by analyzing large volumes of information.

Question 41

key assumptions of inferential statistics

Answer 41

1. sampling from complete target population 2. simple random sampling with perfect response rate (or non response completely random) 3. no nonsampling erorr

Question 42

sampling distribution

Answer 42

if you draw an infinite number of samples of the same size, you will get a sampling distirbution.

Question 43

necessary conditions for causality (4)

Answer 43

1. covariance 2. temporal ordering 3. spatial and temporal contiguity 4. non spurious