Social Research Methods

Writing a thesis is often a challenging and complex enterprise. This episode helps you to understand what will go on inside you and between you and your supervisor. All slides to the entire series can be downloaded for free here: https://armintrost.de/en/professor/digital/social-research-methods/

Writing an academic report or article mainly follows a specific structure, format and style since academic papers differ from all other media most people are familiar with (e.g. news-paper article). All slides to the entire series can be downloaded for free here: https://armintrost.de/en/professor/digital/social-research-methods/

Multidimensional scaling is a statistical procedure to translate distances and dissimilarities into a visual representation. In social science it is used to visualize social relations among people and groups. All slides to the entire series can be downloaded for free here: https://armintrost.de/en/professor/digital/social-research-methods/

We use multiple regression analysis to determine the relation between many (multiple) independent variables and one single dependent variable. All slides to the entire series can be downloaded for free here: https://armintrost.de/en/professor/digital/social-research-methods/

Factor analysis reduces complexity of data by extracting a few factors. It delivers underlying coordinates in an otherwise complicated set of variables. We use factor analysis for instance to understand the basic independent dimensions of personality. All slides to the entire series can be downloaded for free here: https://armintrost.de/en/professor/digital/social-research-methods/

We use variance analysis (ANOVA) to compare variance within and between groups. It is a method to test hypothesis that is in particular suitable for experimental designs. Once there are more than one independent variables we name this MANOVA. All slides to the entire series can be downloaded for free here: https://armintrost.de/en/professor/digital/social-research-methods/

In social science we estimate the probability of the null hypothesis being wrong even though it might be true. Should we reject or accept the null hypothesis over the alternative hypothesis? This is an essential idea in inferential statistics. All slides to the entire series can be downloaded for free here: https://armintrost.de/en/professor/digital/social-research-methods/

While we know the mean and standard deviation of our sample we don’t know the real ones. That’s why we estimate. There is a reason, why using n-1 instead of N when estimating standard deviation of the population based on a sample. All slides to the entire series can be downloaded for free here: https://armintrost.de/en/professor/digital/social-research-methods/

With z transformation you can transform any kind of variable into a variable that has a mean of 0 and a standard deviation of 1. By doing so, variables become comparable. It’s an essential idea when it comes to inferential statistics. All slides to the entire series can be downloaded for free here: https://armintrost.de/en/professor/digital/social-research-methods/

Bivariate statistics help to understand the statistical relation between the independent and the dependent variable. Once you test a hypothesis you always need this kind of statistics. All slides to the entire series can be downloaded for free here: https://armintrost.de/en/professor/digital/social-research-methods/