1. Concepts, units and variables

2. Definition of concepts
A concept is a political phenomenon that varies from low to high
It is unidimensional

3. Examples of concepts? Democracy Political tolerance Culture
Intelligence
Interpersonal trust
Self esteem
Pluralism
Germany
Federalism

4. Units: time, people or places
Units are the observations, which are placed on the unidimensional concept scale according to their low or high values
People are more or less politically tolerant
Countries are more or less democratic
Years have higher or lower rates of crime rates
People are more likely to litigate
Countries can have higher or lower rates of litigation

5. Variables Variables are the operationalizations of concepts
As researchers, we develop a systematic scheme for applying numbers to units
When we do this, we have a variable

6. Examples of variables. What are the possible units?
Murder rate
Litigation rate
Support for freedom of speech
Income
Party identification
Liberalism

7. What is not a variable? Speed of light Parameters Statistics
These are called constants.
Some political phenomena can be concepts and variables for some units but not for others.
September 11th is not a variable with people as the unit.

8. Political tolerance as a concept
Political tolerance is a concept that indicates how much support people have for the civil liberties and rights of their most hated political group.
It is not racial tolerance.
Notice that to “tolerate” something, you have to, by definition, not like it.

9. Operationalization of support for ethnic violence
I will now read some specific strategies that some people recommend to resolve problems in North Ossetia. For each one, please tell me whether you fully approve, somewhat approve, somewhat disapprove, or completely disapprove.
… kill the same number of Chechens as were killed in Beslan
Why: “that some people recommend”
Completely
disapprove
Somewhat
disapprove
Somewhat
approve
Completely
approve 1 2 3 4

10. Types of Variables Ordinal Dichotomous Nominal
All of these variables can be either
Independent
Dependent

11. Dependent variable
This is the political or social phenomenon we are interested in explaining.
It should be important.
And its explanation should matter to us.
For the research question, why does y vary, the dependent variable is the y.
There is only ONE dependent variable in any research project.

12. Independent variables
These are the political or social phenomena we use to explain our dependent variable.
Logic, along with previous literature, can be used to defend why you believe that the independent variables causes the dependent variable.
There should be non-obvious, interesting and important implications from these relationships.

13. Ordinal Measurement
With ordinal variables, there is a rough quantitative sense to their measurement, but the differences between scores are not necessarily equal.
The values are in order but not fixed

14. Examples of Ordinal Measures
Rankings (1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc)
Grades (A, B, C, D, F)
Education (High School, College, Advanced degree)
Evaluations
Hi, Medium, Low
Likert Scales
5 pt (strongly agree, agree, neither agree nor disagree, disagree, strongly disagree)
7 point liberalism scale (strongly liberal, liberal, weakly liberal, moderate, weakly conservative, conservative, strongly conservative)
How carefully will the court consider the hostage’s story?
Very carefully, rather carefully, not very carefully, not carefully at all

15. Ordinal frequency distribution

16. Nominal Variables
With nominal variables, there is no ordinal sense to their measurement
The values are not in order

17. Examples of nominal measures
Race (White, Black, Asian, other)
Occupation (teacher, manager, worker)
Who is most guilty for causing the terrorist attack?
Hostage takers, Putin, Duma, local government

18. Nominal frequency distribution
mainguilt Who or what do you think is mainly guilty for causing your problems?
169
51.8 20
6.1
58.0 43
13.2
71.2 16
4.9
76.1 46
14.1
90.2 7
2.1
92.3 3 .9
93.3 1 .3
93.6 21
6.4
100.0
326
1 Hostage takers
2 President Putin
3 Other federal
authorities
5 Moscow city authorities
6 FSB
7 Militia or GBDD
8 Doctors/emergency
services
97 Refused
99 Unsure
Total
Valid
Frequency
Percent
Valid Percent
Cumulative

19. Causal relationships with variables

20. Independent variable causes dependent variable
Causal model
X  Y
Independent variable causes dependent variable
For example:
Percentage of people living in urban areas causes female literacy
What could be the units of analysis in this example?

21. Predicting Perceptions of Fairness of a Supreme Court Decision
Perception of
Neutrality
Belief that
Conflict is
Necessary
Interest in Politics
Political
Knowledge
-.22 (.10)
.69 (.14)
.27 (.10)
3.22 (.42)
-.45 (.30)
-.58 (.29)
.74 (.25)
.42
(.26)
-.34
(.11)
.43
-.44 (.13)
.48
(.14)
1.30 (.47)
1.00 (.49)
.58
(.21)
.64 (.16)
.60
(.38)
Perception of
Legality
Perception of
Bargaining
Male
Perception that the
Process is Fair
Approval of
Current Justices
Diffuse
Support
Perception of
Future Certainty
Specific
Support
Belief that Conflict
is Necessary
Dogmatism
Support for
Bush v. Gore
Biblical
Fundamentalism
Conservatism
Perception that the
Process Should be
Legalistic

22. Data rows = units columns = variables
Country population Urban% Religion
Austria Catholic
Belgium Catholic
Bosnia Muslim
Bulgaria Orthodox
Canada Catholic
Croatia Catholic
Czech Rep Catholic
Denmark Protestant
Finland Protestant
France Catholic
Germany Protestant
Iceland Protestant

23. Female literacy and urban density20 40 60 80
100
What are the units
in this analysis?
Female Literacy (%)
People living in cities (%)

24. Non-obviousness? Optimism causes political participation
Political efficacy causes political participation
Hatred causes political participation

25. Non-obviousness? Interpersonal trust causes democratic stability
Veto players (number of checks and balances) cause democratic stability
Economic stability causes democratic stability

26. Non-obviousness? Urbanization causes suicide rates to increase
Medical marijuana causes lower suicide rates
Medical marijuana causes spending on Medicare to decrease

27. Non-obviousness? Religiosity causes low environmentalism
Social identity salience over material identity salience causes support for courts

28. Non-obviousness?
Experience with violence as a child causes empathy? Or lack of empathy?
Perhaps it is conditional?

29. Non-obviousness?
High opiate brain chemistry resulting from learning causes perseverance
High opiate brain chemistry causes drug use
Parent’s drug use causes children’s future drug use
Wealth causes drug use