Research Design

Course syllabus

What do we mean by political “science”? It is the way we study politics right, and this course will introduce it. We will discuss the components of a good research design, including how to raise an interesting question, connect your theoretical argument with empirical evidence, and collect and analyze data to examine your argument. This course also introduces some basic concepts and tools of quantitative analysis. POLS 6010 is designed as the entry-level method seminar for graduate students in political science. Walking out of this class, you will gain an understanding of how to conduct your own research and evaluate the work of your peer political scientists. The seminar should also help you figure out the path to learning more advanced methods. These basics of social science methodology are transferable to other disciplines and, importantly, other professions outside academia.

In addition to figuring out how to ask “good” research questions, we students will begin to develop a basic toolkit which includes the most common research designs in the social sciences: randomized experiments, observational studies, regression discontinuity designs, and difference-in-difference designs.