SoSe 24: Institut für Soziologie

• Vertiefung

  0181bC1.2
  • 30226 Vertiefungsseminar Abgesagt
    An International Comparison of Empirical Social Research in Germany and the USA from its Beginning until the 1950s (Irmela Gorges)
    Zeit: Do 12:00-14:00 (Erster Termin: 18.04.2024)
    Ort: Ihnestr.22/UG 3 Seminarraum (Ihnestr. 22)
    

    Kommentar

    This course compares and analyses the most important empirical social research studies in Germany and the USA conducted from the middle of the 19th century until the mid 1950s. We will discuss if the possible di?erences in the choices of research themes, the development of new research methods, and the intended use for research results could be caused by the di?erent societal development in both countries. We will check our hypotheses that the di?erences in empirical research resulted from the researchers reaction on the respective political, economic and social situation in both countries. This hypothesis is supported by looking at the breaks of government forms in Germany: From a height of social empirical research during the time of the German Empire (1872 to 1918) empirical social research was disrupted during the Weimar Republic (1919 - 1933) mainly because of economic reasons but also by political struggles. Empirical social research then nearly was terminated in Germany during the Nazi Regime (1933 -1945) because only National Socialistic research themes were allowed to be conducted and promoted. In the USA, in contrast, empirical social research started to develop since the consolidation of the federation of states around the turn of the 19th to the 20th century, and from then developed steadily and with increasing acceleration: Empirical social research was used to stabilize the democratic state. After World War II the USA heavily supported empirical social research in the three, by the USA, Great Britain and France ruled democratic ´Zones´ of Germany, the newly founded Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) (1949), which may be interpreted as a ´reimport´ of parts of basics of empirical social research developed earlier in Germany. New initiatives of empirical social research developed in the FRG did not ?nd the same acceptance.

  • 30218 Vertiefungsseminar Abgesagt
    Advanced Research Design (Mirjam Dageförde)
    Zeit: Di 10:00-12:00 (Erster Termin: 16.04.2024)
    Ort: Garystr.55/323 Seminarraum (Garystr. 55)
    

    Kommentar

    Advanced Research Design This course trains the analytical and research skills of Master students serving as a preparation or training for crucial aspects of students’ term papers, master thesis or internships at research institutes. These skills are essential for excellent studies, evaluations and also for evaluating expert recommendations or reports in the future career at universities, (international) institutions, research centers, politics, NGOs or elsewhere. The analytical skills that are trained and sharpened in this course serve as an additional – and increasingly required skill – for students and professionals in the social sciences.
    
    The target group of this class are MA Students in their 2nd year, for instance those who are about to register for their master thesis or who are in the process of writing them. The aims of the course are to strengthen students’ analytical skills and to improve their abilities to evaluate a research design. With regard to academic writing, the course enables students to sharpen research questions and hypotheses and to improve methodological approaches for diverging research questions. You should be able to assess the state of the existing literature, identify research questions of interest, formulate strategies to answer them, know the methodological tools with which to conduct the research, and write up the results so that they can contribute to existing knowledge. The class will use examples from social sciences and discuss current research of students, the course will familiarize you with current standards of research in social sciences. Although the course is not in itself a lecture on statistical methods, it also refers to quantitative methods.
    
    Course Objectives

    • Assessing the rigidity and validity of reports and studies – their set-up and the presented findings.
    • Knowledge of the elements and relevance of a research design
    • Produce a rigorous and precise research design
    • Formulate research questions & hypotheses
    • Individual and collective components
    
    Academic Integrity
    This course is based on the principles of academic integrity established by Freie Universität Berlin. Academic dishonesty will not be tolerated. All documents submitted must be your own work and sources must be properly cited

  • 30227 Vertiefungsseminar
    Introduction to Machine Learning for Social Sciences (Bruno de Castanho Silva)
    Zeit: Do 14:00-16:00 (Erster Termin: 18.04.2024)
    Ort: Garystr.55/302b Seminarraum (Garystr. 55)
    

    Kommentar

    From chatGPT to policy design and implementation, machine learning algorithms are ubiquitous in a big data world. Their potential is now being explored in the social sciences. In this course participants will learn the fundamentals of machine learning as a data analysis approach, and will have an overview of the most common and versatile classes of ML techniques in use today and how they can be applied to sociological research. The goal is that at the end participants will be able to identify what kind of technique is more suitable for different questions and data, and how to design, test and interpret their models. They will also be equipped with sufficient basic knowledge to proceed independently for more advanced algorithms and problems. This is an introductory course, so that math and programming technicalities will be kept to a minimum, but it is good if students are familiar with linear regression. The practical applications are done in R, and having worked with it before is certainly helpful.

  • 30228 Vertiefungsseminar Abgesagt
    Beyond Surveys (Dr. Carina Cornesse)
    Zeit: Di 14:00-16:00 (Erster Termin: 16.04.2024)
    Ort: Garystr.55/302a Seminarraum (Garystr. 55)
    

    Kommentar

    Quantitative empirical social research has traditionally used two main types of data: First, survey data, in which population samples were examined either once (cross-sectionally) or several times (longitudinally) using questionnaires. Survey data have for a long time been the sole source of data for research on attitudes, preferences, and life situations. Second, process-generated and administrative data collected within the framework of official statistics have been analyzed, usually at a slow pace and with many access limitations. As a result of ongoing digitalization, a lot of data is accumulating online that can also provide increasingly comprehensive information about public opinion as well as people’s living conditions and behavior. These data can be used for answering central sociological research questions. This refers not only to social media data, but also to usage or observational data as collected via smartphones or other measurement devices. In the social sciences, a new field of research ("computational social sciences") is currently developing that explores the possibilities of using these data, including the question of their methodological quality. In this seminar, the development of these new data spaces for social science research will be presented and discussed using selected examples. This will include hands-on practice sessions, where participants can gain an impression of the benefits and limitations of such digital data.

  • 30229 Vertiefungsseminar Abgesagt
    Qualitative analysis of experiences of displaced migrants in Europe (Céline Teney & Daria Potapova)
    Zeit: Di 14:00-16:00 (Erster Termin: 16.04.2024)
    Ort: Garystr.55/302b Seminarraum (Garystr. 55)
    

    Kommentar

    In this seminar, we will first discuss main current theories for understanding the experiences of displaced migrants. We will then review some methodological accounts on qualitative data analysis. We will then apply these theories empirically on a set of interviews conducted among displaced Ukrainians who fled from the Russian invasion of 24th February 2022 to Berlin, Warsaw and Budapest. Students are expected to carry out their own qualitative analysis on the interview selection.

  • 30235 Vertiefungsseminar
    Intermediate Data Analysis and Visualization in R (Vivien Fabry)
    Zeit: Mi 16-18 (Erster Termin: 17.04.2024)
    Ort: Garystr.55/204 PC-Pool (Garystr. 55)
    

    Kommentar

    This course aims to advance your understanding beyond the basics of R, concentrating on best practices in data wrangling, analysis, and visualization. It is recommended for students seeking to either refresh or improve their existing knowledge of R. For data wrangling, students will delve into the tidyverse packages and learn how to use them to clean, merge, and prepare datasets for analysis. The course also introduces students to various strategies to enhance their workflow while working with R. Additionally, the course will explore the art of crafting visualizations for data exploration and presentation, ranging from barplots to heatmaps. Furthermore, this course will teach and utilize Rmarkdown — a document format that allows the integration of code, enabling the creation of reproducible data reports that consolidate all aspects of the analysis.

  • 31505a Übung
    From Interviews to Inference. How to explore social structures & processes (Mihai Varga)
    Zeit: Do 10:00-12:00 (Erster Termin: 18.04.2024)
    Ort: Garystr.55/301 Seminarraum (Garystr. 55)
    

    Kommentar

    This seminar discusses research strategies for exploring broader social processes and structures through interviews, (non-)participant observation, and fieldwork. We will begin by discussing how to develop research questions, (hypo)theses, and case selection (research design), and then look more closely at how to plan, conduct, and analyze interview material to answer research questions. Students are expected to conduct and analyse own interviews and also code and analyze already collected interview material.

  • 32603a Seminar
    Introducing Text Analysis with R through Political Party Manifestos from US (Osman Demirbag)
    Zeit: Mo 16:00-18:00 (Erster Termin: 15.04.2024)
    Ort: 201 Seminarraum (Lansstr. 7 / 9)
    

    Kommentar

    This research seminar guides students through the methodological frameworks for analyzing political texts as historical data, with a strong emphasis on quantitative text analysis. The course begins with an examination of the interplay between US party politics and economic policymaking from the 1840s to the present day, setting the stage for an in-depth understanding of historical sociology. Building on this historical backdrop, the seminar leads students in the systematic collection and curation of political texts, with a focus on party manifestos as pivotal sources for historical research. ----- As the course progresses, students will work with R for coding, statistical analysis, data visualization, and to implement automated text analysis techniques. Throughout the seminar, in-depth discussions will explore the successes and challenges of formal text analysis, particularly regarding interpretation and explanation in social sciences. This critical engagement will enable students to proficiently analyze the political and economic narratives within historical documents, thereby enhancing the scholarly exploration of quantifying qualitative aspects in political party research.

• Module ohne Lehrangebot in diesem Semester

  1 Modul
  • Forschungspraktikum 0181bC1.1