Soci 3352 - Social Statistics

 

 

Course Description

The course covers both descriptive and inferential statistics including the organization and presentation of data, measures of central tendency and variability, relationships between variables and measures of association, the normal distribution, sampling and sampling distributions, estimation, and hypothesis testing.  We will use the following software: SPSS (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences).  Prerequisites: sophomore standing or permission of instructor.

 


Student Learning Outcomes

Upon completion of the course, students will be able to:
1. Identify the strengths and weaknesses of existing statistical research
2. Identify an appropriate statistical technique for particular research questions
3. Calculate and interpret descriptive and inferential statistics
4. Describe fundamental statistical terms including central tendency, variability, association, and inference

 

 

Office Hours and Support

Professor:

Bob Kunovich

Office: UH 442

Office Hours: Tuesdays and Thursdays 1:00-2:00

and by appointment

Office Telephone: 817-272-3796

E-mail: Kunovich@uta.edu

Teaching Assistant:

Jaala Robinson

Office: UH 415

Office Hours: Thursdays 12:30-3:30

E-mail: Jaala.Robinson@mavs.uta.edu

 

 

Handouts and Downloads

01/15 - Syllabus

01/17 - Assignment 1, Basic SPSS Help, Frequency Distributions, Frequency Distributions with SPSS, Graphic Presentation

01/22 - Measures of Central Tendency

01/24 - Assignment 2

01/29 - Measures of Variability

01/31 - Assignment 3, Variability Practice Problems and Solutions, Example from class

02/05 - Exam 1 Review Sheet, Exam 1 Practice Problems and Solutions

02/07 - Exam 1 Formula Sheet (I will bring copies for everyone, this is here so that you know what to expect)

 

 

02/12 - Probability Experiments

02/14 - Assignment 4, The Normal Distribution

02/21 - Sampling and Sampling Distributions

02/26 - Additional sampling distribution examples

02/28 - Assignment 5, Estimation

03/05 - Assignment 6, Hypothesis Testing

03/07 - Exam 2 Review Sheet, Exam 2 Practice Problems and Solutions, Exam 2 Formula Sheet (I will bring copies for everyone, this is here so that you know what to expect)

03/21 - Exam 2 (originally scheduled for Thursday, March 21) will take place Tuesday, March 26; we need another two classes to master hypothesis testing

 

 

03/28 - Revised Schedule, Cross-tabulation

04/02 - Assignment 7, Chi-square, Chi-square 2

04/04 - M&M Results

04/09 - Measures of Association, Titanic data and example

04/16 - Practice problems

04/18 - Assignment 8, Bivariate Association, Bivariate Association 2

04/23 - Practice Problem and Solution

05/02 - Exam 3 Review Sheet, Exam 3 Practice Problems and Solutions, Exam 3 Formula Sheet (I will bring copies for everyone, this is here so that you know what to expect)

 

 

 

SPSS

The Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) is available in the Business and University Hall computing labs.  See the OIT web page for lab locations and hours.  Although you may use SPSS in these labs, some prefer to install SPSS on their own computer.  Purchasing the software is quite expensive, but it is possible to rent SPSS for a reasonable price (approximately $40 for 6 months).  If you choose to rent the software, the "statistics base grad pack" is all that would be needed for this course. 

 

 

Data

We will be using data from several sources.  The data files are available for download from the book's study page (the first link below).  Do not wait to access the data until the last minute.  You should assume that you will have trouble and will need help.

 


Web Pages
Social Statistics for a Diverse Society: Student Study Web Page
The National Opinion Research Center
    The General Social Survey
SPSS
UCLA Stat Computing Portal: SPSS Portal
 


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