Quantitative Data Analysis: Doing Social Research to Test Ideas

This book is an accessible introduction to quantitative data analysis, concentrating on the key issues facing those new to research, such as how to decide which statistical procedure is suitable, and how to interpret the subsequent results. Each chapter includes illustrative examples and a set of exercises that allows readers to test their understanding of the topic. The book, written for graduate students in the social sciences, public health, and education, offers a practical approach to making sociological sense out of a body of quantitative data. The book also will be useful to more experienced researchers who need a readily accessible handbook on quantitative methods. The author has posted stata files, updates and data sets at his website http://tinyurl.com/Treiman-stata-files-data-sets.

Table of Contents:
Tables, Figures, Exhibits, and Boxes xi Preface xxiii The Author xxvii Introduction xxix 1 CROSS-TABULATIONS 1 What This Chapter Is About 1 Introduction to the Book via a Concrete Example 2 Cross-Tabulations 8 What This Chapter Has Shown 19 2 MORE ON TABLES 21 What This Chapter Is About 21 The Logic of Elaboration 22 Suppressor Variables 25 Additive and Interaction Effects 26 Direct Standardization 28 A Final Note on Statistical Controls Versus Experiments 43 What This Chapter Has Shown 45 3 STILL MORE ON TABLES 47 What This Chapter Is About 47 Reorganizing Tables to Extract New Information 48 When to Percentage a Table "Backwards" 50 Cross-Tabulations in Which the Dependent Variable Is Represented by a Mean 52 Index of Dissimilarity 58 Writing About Cross-Tabulations 61 What This Chapter Has Shown 63 4 ON THE MANIPULATION OF DATA BY COMPUTER 65 What This Chapter Is About 65 Introduction 66 How Data Files Are Organized 67 Transforming Data 72 What This Chapter Has Shown 80 Appendix 4.A Doing Analysis Using Stata 80 Tips on Doing Analysis Using Stata 80 Some Particularly Useful Stata 10.0 Commands 84 5 INTRODUCTION TO CORRELATION AND REGRESSION (ORDINARY LEAST SQUARES) 87 What This Chapter Is About 87 Introduction 88 Quantifying the Size of a Relationship: Regression Analysis 89 Assessing the Strength of a Relationship: Correlation Analysis 91 The Relationship Between Correlation and Regression Coeffi cients 94 Factors Affecting the Size of Correlation (and Regression) Coeffi cients 94 Correlation Ratios 99 What This Chapter Has Shown 102 6 INTRODUCTION TO MULTIPLE CORRELATION AND REGRESSION (ORDINARY LEAST SQUARES) 103 What This Chapter Is About 103 Introduction 104 A Worked Example: The Determinants of Literacy in China 113 Dummy Variables 120 A Strategy for Comparisons Across Groups 124 A Bayesian Alternative for Comparing Models 133 Independent Validation 135 What This Chapter Has Shown 136 7 MULTIPLE REGRESSION TRICKS: TECHNIQUES FOR HANDLING SPECIAL ANALYTIC PROBLEMS 139 What This Chapter Is About 139 Nonlinear Transformations 140 Testing the Equality of Coeffi cients 147 Trend Analysis: Testing the Assumption of Linearity 149 Linear Splines 152 Expressing Coeffi cients as Deviations from the Grand Mean (Multiple Classifi cation Analysis) 164 Other Ways of Representing Dummy Variables 166 Decomposing the Difference Between Two Means 172 What This Chapter Has Shown 179 8 MULTIPLE IMPUTATION OF MISSING DATA 181 What This Chapter Is About 181 Introduction 182 A Worked Example: The Effect of Cultural Capital on Educational Attainment in Russia 187 What This Chapter Has Shown 194 9 SAMPLE DESIGN AND SURVEY ESTIMATION 195 What This Chapter Is About 195 Survey Samples 196 Conclusion 223 What This Chapter Has Shown 224 10 REGRESSION DIAGNOSTICS 225 What This Chapter Is About 225 Introduction 226 A Worked Example: Societal Differences in Status Attainment 229 Robust Regression 237 Bootstrapping and Standard Errors 238 What This Chapter Has Shown 240 11 SCALE CONSTRUCTION 241 What This Chapter Is About 241 Introduction 242 Validity 242 Reliability 243 Scale Construction 246 Errors-in-Variables Regression 258 What This Chapter Has Shown 261 12 LOG-LINEAR ANALYSIS 263 What This Chapter Is About 263 Introduction 264 Choosing a Preferred Model 265 Parsimonious Models 277 A Bibliographic Note 294 What This Chapter Has Shown 295 Appendix 12.A Derivation of the Effect Parameters 295 Appendix 12.B Introduction to Maximum Likelihood Estimation 297 Mean of a Normal Distribution 298 Log-Linear Parameters 299 13 BINOMIAL LOGISTIC REGRESSION 301 What This Chapter Is About 301 Introduction 302 Relation to Log-Linear Analysis 303 A Worked Logistic Regression Example: Predicting Prevalence of Armed Threats 304 A Second Worked Example: Schooling Progression Ratios in Japan 314 A Third Worked Example (Discrete-Time Hazard-Rate Models): Age at First Marriage 318 A Fourth Worked Example (Case-Control Models): Who Was Appointed to a Nomenklatura Position in Russia? 327 What This Chapter Has Shown 329 Appendix 13.A Some Algebra for Logs and Exponents 330 Appendix 13.B Introduction to Probit Analysis 330 14 MULTINOMIAL AND ORDINAL LOGISTIC REGRESSION AND TOBIT REGRESSION 335 What This Chapter Is About 335 Multinomial Logit Analysis 336 Ordinal Logistic Regression 342 Tobit Regression (and Allied Procedures) for Censored Dependent Variables 353 Other Models for the Analysis of Limited Dependent Variables 360 What This Chapter Has Shown 361 15 IMPROVING CAUSAL INFERENCE: FIXED EFFECTS AND RANDOM EFFECTS MODELING 363 What This Chapter Is About 363 Introduction 364 Fixed Effects Models for Continuous Variables 365 Random Effects Models for Continuous Variables 371 A Worked Example: The Determinants of Income in China 372 Fixed Effects Models for Binary Outcomes 375 A Bibliographic Note 380 What This Chapter Has Shown 380 16 FINAL THOUGHTS AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS: RESEARCH DESIGN AND INTERPRETATION ISSUES 381 What this Chapter is About 381 Research Design Issues 382 The Importance of Probability Sampling 397 A Final Note: Good Professional Practice 400 What This Chapter Has Shown 405 Appendix A: Data Descriptions and Download Locations for the Data Used in This Book 407 Appendix B: Survey Estimation with the General Social Survey 411 References 417 Index 431