Are there differences between boys and girls in terms of behavior, verbal ability, or math skills, and if so, why? How do factors like parental divorce or poverty affect children? What are the consequences of maternal smoking during pregnancy in terms of children’s health and development?
In this two-part research lab, participants carry out their own empirical project on such or similar topics in the area of child and youth development using data from the Children of the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth. During the first semester, participants develop a research question based on a previous study using these data and start with data preparation. The semester concludes with a proposal that specifies the research question, outlines the motivation and theoretical background, and describes the data and methods used to answer it. The second semester is devoted to finalizing data preparation, to carrying out the data analysis, and to writing the research report.
A key goal of the course is to establish a workflow for transparent and reproducible empirical social research (on any topic). To this end, participants practice how to prepare research data (e.g., merging data sets, recoding variables, constructing analytical samples), how to efficiently produce formatted research output (e.g., tables and figures), and, most importantly, how to rigorously document these tasks so that others (including one’s future self!) can understand and repeat each step of the research process and build on the work.