Download or read book Social Inquiry and Bayesian Inference written by Tasha Fairfield and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2022-08-04 with total page 683 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Fairfield and Charman provide a modern, rigorous and intuitive methodology for case-study research to help social scientists and analysts make better inferences from qualitative evidence. The book develops concrete guidelines for conducting inference to best explanation given incomplete information; no previous exposure to Bayesian analysis or specialized mathematical skills are needed. Topics covered include constructing rival hypotheses that are neither too simple nor overly complex, assessing the inferential weight of evidence, counteracting cognitive biases, selecting cases, and iterating between theory development, data collection, and analysis. Extensive worked examples apply Bayesian guidelines, showcasing both exemplars of intuitive Bayesian reasoning and departures from Bayesian principles in published case studies drawn from process-tracing, comparative, and multimethod research. Beyond improving inference and analytic transparency, an overarching goal of this book is to revalue qualitative research and place it on more equal footing with respect to quantitative and experimental traditions by illustrating that Bayesianism provides a universally applicable inferential framework.
Download or read book Bayesian Inference in the Social Sciences written by Ivan Jeliazkov and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2014-11-04 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Presents new models, methods, and techniques and considers important real-world applications in political science, sociology, economics, marketing, and finance Emphasizing interdisciplinary coverage, Bayesian Inference in the Social Sciences builds upon the recent growth in Bayesian methodology and examines an array of topics in model formulation, estimation, and applications. The book presents recent and trending developments in a diverse, yet closely integrated, set of research topics within the social sciences and facilitates the transmission of new ideas and methodology across disciplines while maintaining manageability, coherence, and a clear focus. Bayesian Inference in the Social Sciences features innovative methodology and novel applications in addition to new theoretical developments and modeling approaches, including the formulation and analysis of models with partial observability, sample selection, and incomplete data. Additional areas of inquiry include a Bayesian derivation of empirical likelihood and method of moment estimators, and the analysis of treatment effect models with endogeneity. The book emphasizes practical implementation, reviews and extends estimation algorithms, and examines innovative applications in a multitude of fields. Time series techniques and algorithms are discussed for stochastic volatility, dynamic factor, and time-varying parameter models. Additional features include: Real-world applications and case studies that highlight asset pricing under fat-tailed distributions, price indifference modeling and market segmentation, analysis of dynamic networks, ethnic minorities and civil war, school choice effects, and business cycles and macroeconomic performance State-of-the-art computational tools and Markov chain Monte Carlo algorithms with related materials available via the book’s supplemental website Interdisciplinary coverage from well-known international scholars and practitioners Bayesian Inference in the Social Sciences is an ideal reference for researchers in economics, political science, sociology, and business as well as an excellent resource for academic, government, and regulation agencies. The book is also useful for graduate-level courses in applied econometrics, statistics, mathematical modeling and simulation, numerical methods, computational analysis, and the social sciences.
Download or read book Designing Social Inquiry written by Gary King and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2021-08-17 with total page 266 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The classic work on qualitative methods in political science Designing Social Inquiry presents a unified approach to qualitative and quantitative research in political science, showing how the same logic of inference underlies both. This stimulating book discusses issues related to framing research questions, measuring the accuracy of data and the uncertainty of empirical inferences, discovering causal effects, and getting the most out of qualitative research. It addresses topics such as interpretation and inference, comparative case studies, constructing causal theories, dependent and explanatory variables, the limits of random selection, selection bias, and errors in measurement. The book only uses mathematical notation to clarify concepts, and assumes no prior knowledge of mathematics or statistics. Featuring a new preface by Robert O. Keohane and Gary King, this edition makes an influential work available to new generations of qualitative researchers in the social sciences.
Download or read book Rethinking Social Inquiry written by Henry E. Brady and published by Rowman & Littlefield Publishers. This book was released on 2010-09-16 with total page 429 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With innovative new chapters on process tracing, regression analysis, and natural experiments, the second edition of Rethinking Social Inquiry further extends the reach of this path-breaking book. The original debate with King, Keohane, and Verba_now updated_remains central to the volume, and the new material illuminates evolving discussions of essential methodological tools. Thus, process tracing is often invoked as fundamental to qualitative analysis, but is rarely applied with precision. Pitfalls of regression analysis are sometimes noted, but often are inadequately examined. And the complex assumptions and trade-offs of natural experiments are poorly understood. The second edition extends the methodological horizon through exploring these critical tools. A distinctive feature of this edition is the online placement of four chapters from the prior edition, all focused on the dialogue with King, Keohane, and Verba. Also posted online are exercises for teaching process tracing and understanding process tracing.
Download or read book Designing Social Inquiry written by Gary King and published by . This book was released on 1994 with total page 245 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Designing Social Inquiry written by Robert O Et Al Keohane and published by . This book was released on 1994-01-01 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Redesigning Social Inquiry written by Charles C. Ragin and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2009-05-15 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For over twenty years Charles C. Ragin has been at the forefront of the development of innovative methods for social scientists. In Redesigning Social Inquiry, he continues his campaign to revitalize the field, challenging major aspects of the conventional template for social science research while offering a clear alternative. Redesigning Social Inquiry provides a substantive critique of the standard approach to social research—namely, assessing the relative importance of causal variables drawn from competing theories. Instead, Ragin proposes the use of set-theoretic methods to find a middle path between quantitative and qualitative research. Through a series of contrasts between fuzzy-set analysis and conventional quantitative research, Ragin demonstrates the capacity for set-theoretic methods to strengthen connections between qualitative researchers’ deep knowledge of their cases and quantitative researchers’ elaboration of cross-case patterns. Packed with useful examples, Redesigning Social Inquiry will be indispensable to experienced professionals and to budding scholars about to embark on their first project.
Download or read book Case Studies and Theory Development in the Social Sciences written by Alexander L. George and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2005-04-15 with total page 347 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The use of case studies to build and test theories in political science and the other social sciences has increased in recent years. Many scholars have argued that the social sciences rely too heavily on quantitative research and formal models and have attempted to develop and refine rigorous methods for using case studies. This text presents a comprehensive analysis of research methods using case studies and examines the place of case studies in social science methodology. It argues that case studies, statistical methods, and formal models are complementary rather than competitive. The book explains how to design case study research that will produce results useful to policymakers and emphasizes the importance of developing policy-relevant theories. It offers three major contributions to case study methodology: an emphasis on the importance of within-case analysis, a detailed discussion of process tracing, and development of the concept of typological theories. Case Studies and Theory Development in the Social Sciences will be particularly useful to graduate students and scholars in social science methodology and the philosophy of science, as well as to those designing new research projects, and will contribute greatly to the broader debate about scientific methods.
Download or read book The Production of Knowledge written by Colin Elman and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2020-03-19 with total page 569 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A wide-ranging discussion of factors that impede the cumulation of knowledge in the social sciences, including problems of transparency, replication, and reliability. Rather than focusing on individual studies or methods, this book examines how collective institutions and practices have (often unintended) impacts on the production of knowledge.
Download or read book Process Tracing written by Andrew Bennett and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2015 with total page 345 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book provides empirically grounded conceptual, design and practical advice on conducting process tracing, a key method of qualitative research.
Download or read book Rethinking Comparison written by Erica S. Simmons and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2021-10-07 with total page 303 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Qualitative comparative methods – and specifically controlled qualitative comparisons – are central to the study of politics. They are not the only kind of comparison, though, that can help us better understand political processes and outcomes. Yet there are few guides for how to conduct non-controlled comparative research. This volume brings together chapters from more than a dozen leading methods scholars from across the discipline of political science, including positivist and interpretivist scholars, qualitative methodologists, mixed-methods researchers, ethnographers, historians, and statisticians. Their work revolutionizes qualitative research design by diversifying the repertoire of comparative methods available to students of politics, offering readers clear suggestions for what kinds of comparisons might be possible, why they are useful, and how to execute them. By systematically thinking through how we engage in qualitative comparisons and the kinds of insights those comparisons produce, these collected essays create new possibilities to advance what we know about politics.
Download or read book Research Design written by John M. Bynner and published by AldineTransaction. This book was released on with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Research Design: The Logic of Social Inquiry is a collection of critical writings on different aspects of social research. They have been carefully selected for the variety of approaches they display in relation to three broad styles of research: experimental, survey, and ethnographic. All are classic contributions to the development of methodology and excellent expositions of particular procedures. The book is organized in sections that detail the methods of a typical experimental research program design, data collection, and data analysis. These five sections include The Language of Social Research, Research Design, Data Collection, Measurement, and Data Analysis and Report. Each is preceded by an introduction stressing the unique strengths of the different viewpoints represented and reconciling them in one coherent approach to research. The volume includes displays of philosophical underpinnings of different methodological styles and important issues in research design. Data collection methods, particularly the problem of systematic bias in the data collected, and ways in which researchers may attempt to reduce it, are discussed. There is also a discussion on measurement in which the central issues of reliability, validity, and scale construction are detailed. This kind of synthesis, between such diverse schools of research as the experimentalists and the ethnographers, is of particular concern to social researchers. The book will be of great value to planners and researchers in local government and education departments and to all others engaged in social science or educational research.
Download or read book Bayesian Analysis for the Social Sciences written by Simon Jackman and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2009-10-27 with total page 598 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Bayesian methods are increasingly being used in the social sciences, as the problems encountered lend themselves so naturally to the subjective qualities of Bayesian methodology. This book provides an accessible introduction to Bayesian methods, tailored specifically for social science students. It contains lots of real examples from political science, psychology, sociology, and economics, exercises in all chapters, and detailed descriptions of all the key concepts, without assuming any background in statistics beyond a first course. It features examples of how to implement the methods using WinBUGS – the most-widely used Bayesian analysis software in the world – and R – an open-source statistical software. The book is supported by a Website featuring WinBUGS and R code, and data sets.
Download or read book Statistical Inference as Severe Testing written by Deborah G. Mayo and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2018-09-20 with total page 503 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mounting failures of replication in social and biological sciences give a new urgency to critically appraising proposed reforms. This book pulls back the cover on disagreements between experts charged with restoring integrity to science. It denies two pervasive views of the role of probability in inference: to assign degrees of belief, and to control error rates in a long run. If statistical consumers are unaware of assumptions behind rival evidence reforms, they can't scrutinize the consequences that affect them (in personalized medicine, psychology, etc.). The book sets sail with a simple tool: if little has been done to rule out flaws in inferring a claim, then it has not passed a severe test. Many methods advocated by data experts do not stand up to severe scrutiny and are in tension with successful strategies for blocking or accounting for cherry picking and selective reporting. Through a series of excursions and exhibits, the philosophy and history of inductive inference come alive. Philosophical tools are put to work to solve problems about science and pseudoscience, induction and falsification.
Download or read book Private Wealth and Public Revenue written by Tasha Fairfield and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2015-03-05 with total page 365 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book identifies sources of power that help business and economic elites influence policy decisions.
Download or read book Bayesian Statistics for Experimental Scientists written by Richard A. Chechile and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2020-09-08 with total page 473 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An introduction to the Bayesian approach to statistical inference that demonstrates its superiority to orthodox frequentist statistical analysis. This book offers an introduction to the Bayesian approach to statistical inference, with a focus on nonparametric and distribution-free methods. It covers not only well-developed methods for doing Bayesian statistics but also novel tools that enable Bayesian statistical analyses for cases that previously did not have a full Bayesian solution. The book's premise is that there are fundamental problems with orthodox frequentist statistical analyses that distort the scientific process. Side-by-side comparisons of Bayesian and frequentist methods illustrate the mismatch between the needs of experimental scientists in making inferences from data and the properties of the standard tools of classical statistics. The book first covers elementary probability theory, the binomial model, the multinomial model, and methods for comparing different experimental conditions or groups. It then turns its focus to distribution-free statistics that are based on having ranked data, examining data from experimental studies and rank-based correlative methods. Each chapter includes exercises that help readers achieve a more complete understanding of the material. The book devotes considerable attention not only to the linkage of statistics to practices in experimental science but also to the theoretical foundations of statistics. Frequentist statistical practices often violate their own theoretical premises. The beauty of Bayesian statistics, readers will learn, is that it is an internally coherent system of scientific inference that can be proved from probability theory.
Download or read book Bayesian Statistics the Fun Way written by Will Kurt and published by No Starch Press. This book was released on 2019-07-09 with total page 258 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Fun guide to learning Bayesian statistics and probability through unusual and illustrative examples. Probability and statistics are increasingly important in a huge range of professions. But many people use data in ways they don't even understand, meaning they aren't getting the most from it. Bayesian Statistics the Fun Way will change that. This book will give you a complete understanding of Bayesian statistics through simple explanations and un-boring examples. Find out the probability of UFOs landing in your garden, how likely Han Solo is to survive a flight through an asteroid shower, how to win an argument about conspiracy theories, and whether a burglary really was a burglary, to name a few examples. By using these off-the-beaten-track examples, the author actually makes learning statistics fun. And you'll learn real skills, like how to: - How to measure your own level of uncertainty in a conclusion or belief - Calculate Bayes theorem and understand what it's useful for - Find the posterior, likelihood, and prior to check the accuracy of your conclusions - Calculate distributions to see the range of your data - Compare hypotheses and draw reliable conclusions from them Next time you find yourself with a sheaf of survey results and no idea what to do with them, turn to Bayesian Statistics the Fun Way to get the most value from your data.
