Notes on Social Measurement

Notes on Social Measurement
Author :
Publisher : Russell Sage Foundation
Total Pages : 271
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9781610441650
ISBN-13 : 1610441656
Rating : 4/5 (50 Downloads)

Synopsis Notes on Social Measurement by : Otis Dudley Duncan

"A richly erudite history of measurement and an account of its current state in the social sciences—fascinating, informative, provocative." —James S. Coleman, Unversity of Chicago "Wise and powerful." — American Journal of Sociology "Personal and provocative—an excellent set of historical and critical ruminations from one of social measurement's greatest contributors." —Choice

Handbook of Research Design and Social Measurement

Handbook of Research Design and Social Measurement
Author :
Publisher : David McKay Company
Total Pages : 540
Release :
ISBN-10 : UCAL:B4342454
ISBN-13 :
Rating : 4/5 (54 Downloads)

Synopsis Handbook of Research Design and Social Measurement by : Delbert Charles Miller

" "If a student researcher had only one handbook on their bookshelf, Miller and Salkind's Handbook would certainly have to be it. With the updated material, the addition of the section on ethical issues (which is so well done that I'm recommending it to the departmental representative to the university IRB), and a new Part 4 on "Qualitative Methods," the new Handbook is an indispensable resource for researchers." "Dan Cover, Department of Sociology, Furman University The book considered a "necessity" by many social science researchers and their students has been revised and updated while retaining the features that made it so useful. The emphasis in this new edition is on the tools with which graduate students and more advanced researchers need to become familiar as well as be able to use in order to conduct high quality research.

Social Measurement through Social Surveys

Social Measurement through Social Surveys
Author :
Publisher : Routledge
Total Pages : 248
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9781317053866
ISBN-13 : 1317053869
Rating : 4/5 (66 Downloads)

Synopsis Social Measurement through Social Surveys by : Julie Gibbs

How do academic social scientists and survey professionals use social measurement techniques? How are these techniques applied to specific concepts in empirical research? This book is an important resource for students, academic and professional researchers, offering an overview of both new and practiced methods of social measurement for quantitative survey research. It will provide readers looking to investigate "hot" social science topics with a way of learning how key measurement techniques can be utilised in that topic in a practical way. Emerging from the editors' widely used work on an online social survey resource offering information on key social surveys and their questionnaires entitled ’Question Bank’, this book aims to take this material further. It elaborates on the problems involved with this resource type, providing a comprehensive and unique volume that will enable the reader to have the confidence to use this technique in their own research.

Measuring Culture

Measuring Culture
Author :
Publisher : Columbia University Press
Total Pages : 290
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9780231542586
ISBN-13 : 0231542585
Rating : 4/5 (86 Downloads)

Synopsis Measuring Culture by : John W. Mohr

Social scientists seek to develop systematic ways to understand how people make meaning and how the meanings they make shape them and the world in which they live. But how do we measure such processes? Measuring Culture is an essential point of entry for both those new to the field and those who are deeply immersed in the measurement of meaning. Written collectively by a team of leading qualitative and quantitative sociologists of culture, the book considers three common subjects of measurement—people, objects, and relationships—and then discusses how to pivot effectively between subjects and methods. Measuring Culture takes the reader on a tour of the state of the art in measuring meaning, from discussions of neuroscience to computational social science. It provides both the definitive introduction to the sociological literature on culture as well as a critical set of case studies for methods courses across the social sciences.

Social Support Measurement and Intervention

Social Support Measurement and Intervention
Author :
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Total Pages : 374
Release :
ISBN-10 : 0198029225
ISBN-13 : 9780198029229
Rating : 4/5 (25 Downloads)

Synopsis Social Support Measurement and Intervention by : Sheldon Cohen

Surgery and pharmaceuticals are not the only effective procedures we have to improve our health. The natural human tendency to care for fellow humans, to support them with social networks, has proven to be a powerful treatment as well. As a result, the areas of application for social support intervention have expanded dramatically during the past 20 years. As these areas have expanded, so too has the literature on the theory and measurement of social support. Yet, the literature has focussed on very particular areas. Investigators in the social sciences have mainly focused on the protection that social support confers in the context of stressful life events and transitions, whereas studies in the health sciences have concentrated on the effects of social networks and supports on population mortality and morbidity. Although no single theoretical framework has been widely accepted, there is consensus that both the psychological sense of support and actual expressions of support play critical roles in maintaining health and well being. This book is a state-of-the-art resource for the selection and development of strategies for social support assessment and intervention. Designed for use by behavioral and medical scientists conducting studies of physical illness, psychological adjustment, and psychiatric illness in human populations, this volume presents a broad conceptual framework addressing the role of social support in mental and physical health. The book is divided into four sections. The first provides some historical context as well as a conceptual overview of how social support might influence mental and physical health. The second discusses techniques for measuring social networks and support, and the third addresses the design of different types of support interventions. The final section presents some general comments on the volume and its implications for social support research and intervention. This resource is meant to aid researchers in understanding the conceptual criteria on which measurement and intervention decisions should be made when studying the relations between social support and health. Furthermore, the information provided on both measurement and intervention will be valuable to practitioners interested in designing and evaluating prevention and treatment initiatives. Sponsored by the Fetzer Institute as a follow up to their successful 1995 publication, Measuring Stress, this book will provide the most up to date research on the effects of social support interventions on physical and mental health.

Measurements in the Social Sciences

Measurements in the Social Sciences
Author :
Publisher : AldineTransaction
Total Pages : 476
Release :
ISBN-10 : 0202302725
ISBN-13 : 9780202302720
Rating : 4/5 (25 Downloads)

Synopsis Measurements in the Social Sciences by : Hubert M. Blalock

Among the frustrations constantly confronting the social scientist are those associated with the general process of measurement. The importance of good measurement has long been recognized in principle, but it has often been neglected in practice in many of the social sciences. Now that the methodological tools of multivariate analysis, simultaneous-equation estimation, and causal modeling are diffused more widely into the social sciences, and now that the very serious implications of random and non-random measurement errors are being systematically investigated, it is all the more important that social scientists give top priority to the quality of their data and the clarity of their theoretical conceptualizations, as well as to methods for analyzing fallible data. This book deals with selected problems of measurement and is written for graduate students and professional social scientists, particularly in the technically less developed fields of sociology, political science and anthropology. The book is organized so that, in general, one proceeds from problems of data collection to those of data analysis. It is not intended to be a complete work covering all types of measurement problems that have arisen in the social sciences. Instead, it represents a series of studies of topics that are deemed to be crucial for the advancement of social science research but which have not received sufficient attention in most of the social sciences. The basic purpose is to stimulate further methodological research on measurement and to study the ways in which knowledge that has been accumulated in some fields may be generalized so that it may be applied to others. The book is divided into three major parts. Part I is concerned with applying scaling approaches developed in psychometrics to problems that arise in other social sciences. The focus is on finding better ways to ask questions of respondents so as to raise the level of measurement above that of simple ordinal scales. Part II focuses on multiple-indicator theory and strategies as applied to relatively complex models and to change data. In this section the emphasis shifts to how one analyzes fallible data through the construction of explicit measurement-error models. Part III deals with the statistical analysis of ordinal data, including the interpretation and empirical behaviors of various ordinal measures of association. The final chapter (written by the editor) discusses how ordered-metric assumptions may be used to make more powerful predictions than those characterizing much of contemporary social science. H.M. Blalock, Jr. (1926-1991) was Professor, Department of Sociology, the University of Washington, Seattle. He was recipient of the 1973 ASA Samuel Stouffer Prize, and was a Fellow of the American Statistical Association and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and is a member of the National Academy of Sciences. He was the 70th president of the American Sociological Association.

The Uses and Misuses of Data and Models

The Uses and Misuses of Data and Models
Author :
Publisher : SAGE
Total Pages : 225
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9780761909224
ISBN-13 : 0761909222
Rating : 4/5 (24 Downloads)

Synopsis The Uses and Misuses of Data and Models by : James Bradley

Undeniably, the amount of "information" in our culture has increased by leaps and bounds. At the same time, discussion of values, norms and purpose is often missing from the discourse of social research - especially by those who work within the positivist framework. The authors of this book develop principles to guide the use of data and models in the human sciences. Writing as scholars who are at home with empirical and mathematical social science, yet taking seriously the critiques of this heritage, they propose ways of developing norms without becoming subjective.

Measurement Theory and Applications for the Social Sciences

Measurement Theory and Applications for the Social Sciences
Author :
Publisher : Guilford Publications
Total Pages : 686
Release :
ISBN-10 : 9781462532131
ISBN-13 : 1462532136
Rating : 4/5 (31 Downloads)

Synopsis Measurement Theory and Applications for the Social Sciences by : Deborah L. Bandalos

Which types of validity evidence should be considered when determining whether a scale is appropriate for a given measurement situation? What about reliability evidence? Using clear explanations illustrated by examples from across the social and behavioral sciences, this engaging text prepares students to make effective decisions about the selection, administration, scoring, interpretation, and development of measurement instruments. Coverage includes the essential measurement topics of scale development, item writing and analysis, and reliability and validity, as well as more advanced topics such as exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis, item response theory, diagnostic classification models, test bias and fairness, standard setting, and equating. End-of-chapter exercises (with answers) emphasize both computations and conceptual understanding to encourage readers to think critically about the material. ÿ

Social Measurement

Social Measurement
Author :
Publisher : SAGE Publications, Incorporated
Total Pages : 508
Release :
ISBN-10 : UOM:39015051312232
ISBN-13 :
Rating : 4/5 (32 Downloads)

Synopsis Social Measurement by : Donald T. Campbell

This essential work in social measurement includes: arguments as to why qualitative approaches belong with quantitative ones; a debate with deconstructionists and social constructionists on measurement validity, and an expansion and further explanation of the multitrait-multimethod matrix.

Measurement in the Social Sciences

Measurement in the Social Sciences
Author :
Publisher : Cambridge University Press
Total Pages : 212
Release :
ISBN-10 : 0521222435
ISBN-13 : 9780521222433
Rating : 4/5 (35 Downloads)

Synopsis Measurement in the Social Sciences by : Richard A. Zeller

This textbook is designed to bridge the gap between the theorist and the methodologist by presenting an integrated approach to measurement. By differentiating between random and systematic error, it conveys both statistical techniques and their theoretical underpinnings essential to students of sociology and political science. Rather than developing new technical methods of new theoretical structures, Professors Zeller and Carmines provide thorough explanations of the assumptions, limitations and interpretations of previously established techniques and theories. Written at a level accessible to students of social science with some statistical training, the book does not presume a sophisticated mathematical background. By concentrating on synthesizing the methodological and theoretical realms, Zeller and Carmines demonstrate why measurement considerations are important to research and how measurement principles can be most effectively applied.