Teaching statistics to social science students: Making it valuable

2009

The main of the paper is to summarize and analyse the changes of education of elementary or introductionary statistics in the field of social science studies in Hungarian higher education. In the pre-Bologna period, there was a relatively important differentiation by specialization. Some students had only a one semester course (composed of lecture and seminar), where only descriptive statistics methods were taught. In the case of more methodologically intensive specializations, like sociology, a second semester of inductive statistics was added (this second semester was preceded by a semester of probability theory and consisted of lecture and double seminar). Thereby a total of 60 or 150 contact hours were available to teach the competence of statistical reading. After the implementation of the Bologna process, the available time slots for statistics have been extremely reduced. As a general rule, only a one semester statistics course is offered including only seminars with a total of 30 hours contact hours. In the new situation, the curriculum had to be extremely cut. Between the topics of descriptive statistics one cannot find anymore the index theory and time series analysis. Even if the students do not have any advanced (college level) probability theory, the basics of inductive statistics are included, the concept of interval estimate and hypothesis testing are taught through simple examples. We think that the large decrease of statistics education is not favourable for the students of social sciences, mainly the lack of differentiation. The necessary knowledge is diverse in the specializations of sociology, politology, international relations, and media and communication studies.

2009

According to Méndez Ramírez(1) “Statistics becomes an aid to the process of scientific research; however, in order to be effective differences between what is statistics and the science on which it is applied must be cleared. That is to say, the approaches of assumptions, ...

PS: Political Science & Politics, 2018

ABSTRACTAlthough research methods and statistics play an increasing role in political science and beyond, students all too often find statistics classes intimidating and boring. This need not be the case, however, because statistics classes provide opportunities to pose and answer questions about which students care. This article highlights four steps to making our methods and statistics classes more engaging and meaningful.

Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences, 2010

Most social science curricula include at least a basic component of statistics courses. These courses are typically dreaded by the students who perceive them as 'hard' and 'irrelevant' to their line of academic training. As a result their achievements and performance in the field of scientific literacy are often compromised.

2021

In this paper, we detail a convergent mixed-methods survey of faculty teaching applied social statistics courses, analyzed through a framework of learning theory. The survey explored faculty perceptions and use of recommended strategies for statistics education, perceived barriers to student success, and general recommendations for instruction in applied statistics courses. Results indicate some consistency in practice with the recommendations in the literature, but a lack of consistency was noted for strategies such as student reflections, allowing multiple attempts on assignments, and others. Particular attention is paid to connecting the results to learning theory with the discussion framed around a Statistics Self-Actualization model based on Maslow’s 1943 theory of Hierarchy of Needs. First published June 2020 at Statistics Education Research Journal Archives

In this paper, we detail a convergent mixed-methods survey of faculty teaching applied social statistics courses, analyzed through a framework of learning theory. The survey explored faculty perceptions and use of recommended strategies for statistics education, perceived barriers to student success, and general recommendations for instruction in applied statistics courses. Results indicate some consistency in practice with the recommendations in the literature, but a lack of consistency was noted for strategies such as student reflections, allowing multiple attempts on assignments, and others. Particular attention is paid to connecting the results to learning theory with the discussion framed around a Statistics Self-Actualization model based on Maslow's 1943 theory of Hierarchy of Needs.

Journal of Official Statistics, 2017

This article aims to challenge official statistics providers and statistics educators to ponder on how to help non-specialist adult users of statistics develop those aspects of statistical literacy that pertain to official statistics. We first document the gap in the literature in terms of the conceptual basis and educational materials needed for such an undertaking. We then review skills and competencies that may help adults to make sense of statistical information in areas of importance to society. Based on this review, we identify six elements related to official statistics about which non-specialist adult users should possess knowledge in order to be considered literate in official statistics: (1) the system of official statistics and its work principles; (2) the nature of statistics about society; (3) indicators; (4) statistical techniques and big ideas; (5) research methods and data sources; and (6) awareness and skills for citizens’ access to statistical reports. Based on thi...

Teaching Quantitative Methods: Getting …, 2011

The teaching of quantitative research methods is an integral part of most postgraduate programmes in politics, but less common at undergraduate level. This article explores the extent to which research methods in general, and quantitative research methods in particular, form part of the curricula of Politics departments in the UK. We then discuss an approach for motivating interest in a subject that tends to be unpopular with many students. We recommend an approach that utilises the links between the general quantification of politics with the quantitative study of political phenomena, as well as a combination of basic research methods for all and more advanced student-focused training for some.

2019

How can we prepare students to understand statistical data and get insights regarding trends and changes on key societal issues such as demographic change, crime, unemployment, pay equity, migration, health, racism, and other areas of concern to society? This paper, summarizing issues of my plenary talk, introduces by extending the notion of statistical literacy a sub-discipline we call civic statistics. Civic statistics focuses on understanding statistical information about society, as provided by the media, statistical offices and other statistics providers. Civic statistics skills are required for participation in democratic societies, but include data that are open, official, multivariate and dynamic, and that are usually neglected in regular statistics education. I present some specific features of civic statistics, provide examples and describe implications for curricula, teacher activities and the future of statistical education. In my presentation, I will give a short online...

2014

Quantitative skills are important for studying and understanding social reality. Political science students, however, experience difficulties in acquiring and retaining such skills. Fear of statistics has often been listed among the major causes for this problem. This study aims at understanding the underlying factors for this anxiety and proposes a potential remedy. More specifically, we advocate the integration of quantitative material into non-methodological courses. After assessing the influence of dispositional, course-related and person-related factors on the attitudes towards statistics among political science students, we provide insights into the relation between these attitudes on the one hand and the learning and retention of statistics skills on the other. Our results indicate that a curriculum-wide approach to normalise the use of quantitative methods can not only foster interest in statistics but also foster retention of the acquired skills.