URBS/PLSI 492         "Research Methods"
Richard LeGates          Spring, 1999
Office HSS 137         Office Hours M 1 – 3 and by appointment
Phone (415) 338-2875  e-mail dlegates@sfsu.edu
FAX (415) 338-2391

Course Outline

What kind of research do social scientists, urban planners, public policy professionals, and public administrators do and why? How can a researcher turn a topic of interest into researchable questions? How do researchers find out what is true? What goes into a research design? How can public policy researchers use traditional library resources (including the SFSU library) effectively? What are the most useful electronic library resources available to public policy researchers and how are they used? What different research methods do public policy researcher’s actually use and why? What methods are appropriate in what situations? How do researchers use multiple research methods to triangulate on a problem? What does it take to design, conduct, and analyze a person-to-person, mail, or phone survey? What distinguishes well-formulated questions from poorly formulated ones? How do researchers select survey samples? What are different ways to measure social phenomena? What is quantitative data and how should it be used in social science and public policy research? How do researchers obtain quantitative data and get it into electronic format appropriate for analysis? What kinds of data analysis do public policy researchers do? What is a computerized statistical package and how are they used? What are common procedures to do univariate, bi-variate and multivariate analysis and how do they actually work using SPSS? What are pie, line, and bar charts? When should each be used and when should not be used. How can visual representation of visual data enhance a research report? What should a research report consist of and how should they be written? What makes a good oral presentation? How can computer presentation software enhance communications? What is PowerPoint and how can it be used effectively?

         These are just some of the questions we will be asking and answering in URBS/PLSI 492 "Research Methods" this semester. "Research Methods" will provide an overview of research methods in the social sciences and public policy. This is an applied course for Urban Studies, Political Science, and Public Administration majors. The emphasis is on imparting both conceptual understanding and specific skills students can use in other coursework and their work.

Texts and Zip disk

Required:

      Earl Babbie, The Practice of Social Research 8^th edition
      Monica Longmore, et. al., The Survey Research Project Manual
      One zip disk

Recommended:

      Microsoft Press, Microsoft PowerPoint ’97 Step By Step

Grading

Midterm 30%
Final 30%
Short exercises (4) 40% (10% each)

Students who complete URBS 492 should:

• Understand how to access information from libraries, both in traditional ways and through electronic library resources;
  
• Understand how to access information from the world wide web (www);
  
• Be able to formulate researchable questions and operationalize ways to answer them;
  
• Be acquainted with the principal methods social scientists and public policy professionals use to conduct research: literature search, archival research, observation, ethnographies, interviews, use of unobtrusive measures, case studies, experiments, simulations, survey research, and quantitative data analysis;
  
• Understand the strengths and weaknesses of major research methods and when it is and is not appropriate to use them;
  
• Be able to design a research project using appropriate multiple research methods;
  
• Understand the logic of sampling and be able to draw a sample for a research project;
  
• Be able to design and conduct a survey and analyze survey results;
  
• Understand how to collect quantitative data and get it into electronic format appropriate for analysis;
  
• Be able to use a computerized statistical package (SPSS) to analyze data;
  
• Understand how to represent research results visually, what data graphics are appropriate for what findings, and how to generate commonly-used data graphics;
  
• Understand how social science and public policy research is used;
  
• Understand major ethical issues confronting social scientists and policy researchers and be able to do ethnical research;
  
• Be to prepare a professional research report with an executive summary, report body, text, graphic, and quantitative information, appendices, and bibliography;
  
• Be able to give an effective oral report supported by computerized presentation software (PowerPoint);
  

Feb 1 INTRODUCTION TO THE COURSE. Some in-class research: interviewing, designing and administering a                   survey, observation, and quantitative data analysis. First in-class oral presentations. Description of course contents.
                Handout of course materials. Course requirements, readings, exercises and grading. Discussion of who student are,
                their interests, and what they would like to get out of the course. HUMAN INQUIRY AND SCIENCE. How
                social science research differs from ordinary human inquiry. Theory, not philosophy or belief. Empiricism.
               PARADIGMS, THEORY, AND RESEARCH. Deductive and inductive reasoning. Linking theory and research.

Handouts:   Whoo Are You?
                     Syllabus
                     Terms for Midterm
                    Project # 1: "Asking questions/Literature search/Designing Surveys"

Reading:      Babbie Ch 1 "Human Inquiry and Science" pp 17 - 29
                     Babbie Ch 2 "Paradigms, Theory, and Research" pp 52 - 64

 

      8   CHOOSING A RESEARCH TOPIC AND ASKING QUESTIONS. How to choose a research topic. Setting
            limits. Formulating researchable questions. QUESTIONNAIRE DESIGN. Types of questions to ask: fact, opinion,               attitude, demographic. Writing clear, unambiguous, answerable questions. Question order. Coding. Pretesting.           
           RESEARCH DESIGN. Figuring out what to study. Specifying the purpose(s) of research. Identifying units of 
            analysis: individuals, groups, organizations, social artifacts. The ecological fallacy. Cross-sectional and longitudinal
            analysis. EXPERIMENTS. Similarities and differences between experiments in the natural and social sciences.
            Dependent and independent variables. Experimental and control groups. Pre- and post- testing. Replication. Reliability
            and validity. Quasi-experimental designs. Strengths and weaknesses of experiments. HOW TO DO A RESEARCH
            DESIGN.

Readings: Babbie Ch 4 "Research Design"
                               Ch 9 "Experiments"

Longmore Ch 2 "Choosing A Research Method"
                  Ch 4 "Choosing A Topic"
                  Ch 6 "Questionnaire Design"

    22 SURVEY RESEARCH. Mail, phone, and in-person interview surveys. Strengths and weaknesses of each type of
         survey and surveys in general. Designing and implementing a survey. LITERATURE SEARCHES. What is a literature            search. When, why, and how to do a literature search. Strengths and weaknesses of literature searches. Library research.            SFSU’s conventional and electronic library resources. Investigator, CARL, Lexis-Nexis, EBSCO HOST, FASTDOCS.            Amazon.com, and Melvyl. Proper footnoting and citation. How to cite references in a bibliography. Avoiding plagarism.           USING THE WORLD WIDE WEB (www). The URBS 492 homepage. The BSS, URBS, PLSI, and MPA         
          homepages. Other homepages of particular interest to urban policy researchers: Cyburbia, U.C. Berkeley College of   
          Environmental Design, SSRIC and ABAG. Using Yahoo! and other Search engines. Limiting searches with Boolean             operators. Separating web wheat from web chaff. Downloading information and images from the web. Copyright issues.            Downloading data. Strengths and weaknesses of web-based research. Project # 1 Due.

Reading: Babbie: Ch 10 "Survey Research"
                Appendix A: Using the Library
                Appendix B: Social Research In Cyberspace
                Longmore: Chapter 4 pp. 33 – 35 "Reviewing the Literature"

Handout: Project # 2 "Data collection, entry, and analysis"

Mar 1 FIELD RESEARCH. Observation. Participant Observation. In-depth interviews. Ethnographies. Strengths and
           weaknesses of different field research methods. DATA COLLECTION. Measurement. Nominal, interval, ordinal and              ratio level data. Indicators and dimensions. How computers are used in social research. Collecting and coding data.              Scales and indexes. Variables and variable names. Values and value labels. DATA ENTRY. Manual data entry, CATI              systems, and optical scan sheets. How statistical packages read data. Cleaning data. SAMPLING What is sampling             and why researchers use samples. The logic of sampling. Census v. sample. Probability v. nonprobability samples.              Random, systematic, and stratified samples. Determining sample size.

Readings Babbie Chapter 10  "Survey Research"
                                                5   "Conceptualization & Measurement"
                                               14 "Quantifying Data"
                                                 8 "Sampling"

        Longmore: Chapter 8 "Data Collection and Tabulation"
                                          7 "Sampling"

      8 INTRODUCTION TO SPSS What is a computerized statistical package? The Statistical Package for the Social            Sciences (SPSS). Using existing data files. Entering and editing data in SPSS. Recoding data. How to open a data file.  
         SPSS Commands. Useful basic data analysis commands: LIST, FREQUENCIES, CROSSTABS. Variables.       
         Dependent and Independent variables. Useful basic statistics: MIN, MAX, MEDIAN, MEAN. CASE
         STUDIES. What is a case study. How to do case studies. Strengths and weaknesses of case studies.

Readings: Babbie Ch 6 "Operationalization"
                                     7 "Indexes and Scales"
                                         Appendix I: Learners Guide to SPSS

      15  INTRODUCTION TO QUANTITATIVE DATA ANALYSIS # 1. Univariate analyses. Distributions. Central
            tendency. Dispersion. Bivariate analysis. Constructing and reading tables. Percentaging a table. ARCHIVAL
            RESEARCH. What is archival research. When and how to do it. Strengths and weaknesses of archival research.               REVIEW FOR MIDTERM

Readings: Babbie Ch 15 "Elementary Analyses"
                  Longmore: Ch 9 "Data Analysis"

Reading: No required reading

April 5 MIDTERM POSTMORTEM. DATA ANALYSIS # 2 The elaboration model. Replication. Explanation.                Interpretation. Specification. Exploratory data analysis. Measures of association. Correlation and           
             regression. CASE STUDIES. What are case studies. When, why, and how to do a case study. Strengths and                weaknesses of case studies. THE VISUAL REPRESENTATION OF QUANTITATIVE INFORMATION.                Data graphics: Pie, bar, and line charts. When to use what graphic. Common mistakes. How to create data               
             graphics using SPSS. Other visuals.

Readings: Babbie Ch 3 "The Nature of Causation"
                              Ch 16 "The Elaboration Model"
                              Ch 17 "Social Statistics" pp 404 - 415
                              Handout: Project # 3 "Research Reports"

   12 THE RESEARCH REPORT. Report considerations: timing, drafts, and revisions. Considering the audience: writing            professionally but without jargon. Purpose. Length and format. Organization of reports. Report components:           Title            page, abstract, table of contents, introduction/statement of problem, literature review, research  hypo-                       
         theses/objectives, research design and methodology, results, conclusions and recommendations, limitations,                    

         appendices. PRESENTING FINDINGS. What makes a professional presentation. Presenting findings through the            right mix of text, data, and graphics. Oral briefings. Reaching your audience. Computer-enhanced presentations.          
        POWERPOINT. What is PowerPoint. When, why, and how to use PowerPoint. PowerPoint Basics. Starting a                new presentation. Creating a new slide in slide view. Entering text in outline view. PowerPoint views. Changing                presentation views. Moving from slide to slide. Adding and changing text in slides. Previewing slides in slide               
            sorter view. Saving a presentation. Rearranging slides in slide sorter view. Running slide shows. Project # 2 Due.

    19 PowerPoint LAB SESSION Inserting objects into PowerPoint: clip art, images, text, spreadsheet output, SPSS output.
         Transitions between slides. Animating slide shows. Creating effective computer-mediated oral presentations. Printing out
         slides as audience handouts.

Readings: No required reading
                  Recommended Microsoft PowerPoint '97 Step By Step Chs 5, 7, 9 11
                  Handout: Project # 4 "Research Design"

    26 RESEARCH DESIGN REVISITED. Reviewing research design now that we have discussed major social science            and public policy research methods. Review of methods: literature review, web searching, archival research, observation           (including participant observation), ethnographies, interviews, survey(s), case studies, experiments, simulations,                  quantitative data analysis. Components of a research design: Problem statement. Description of methods that will be           used. Timeline. Operationalizing how research will be done. Anticipating and avoiding problems. Specifying what the           report will consist of. Setting realistic boundaries and sticking to them. Project # 3 "Research Reports" Due.

Reading: Review Babbie Ch 4 "Research Design", Longmore Ch 2 on
               "Choosing a Research Methods" and Babbie Chs 9 -13 and
                class notes on different research methods which are used by
                social scientists and public policy researchers.

 

May 3 USES OF RESEARCH How public organizations use research: planning, management, and evaluation research.       
            Basic research for scholarly purposes. Applied public policy research. ETHICAL AND POLITICAL ISSUES IN
            SOCIAL AND PUBLIC POLICY RESEARCH Voluntary participation. No harm to participants. Anonymity and
            confidentiality. Deceiving subjects. Analysis and reporting. Institutional review boards. Retaining independence
            from funding sources. Speaking truth to power.

Reading: Babbie Ch 1 "Human Inquiry and Science" pp 38 - 39
                            Ch 18 "The Ethics and Politics of Social Research"
                            Ch 19 "The Uses of Social Research"

       9 STUDENT PRESENTATIONS In class presentation of Project 4 "Research Design." Computer-mediated reports on
          student research designs. Project # 4 Due.

Reading: No required reading

Reading: No required Reading

 

 

Final Exam: Monday May 24 6:00 – 8:00