POLS2009 Study Guide - Final Guide: General Idea, Meta-Analysis, Experiment
Document Summary
Choosing something that matters practical and theoretical significance. Conduct a meta-analysis: an overview of findings from statistical research already conducted on the issue. Useful if time/resource constrained but may not be upto date. Concepts play a key role in determining the questions one asks and the answers one gets. What is a concept: a concept is a general idea that contains the term, properties or attributes and the collected of phenomena contained by the term: a general idea derived or inferred from specific instances or occurrences. 2. made up of three components: 1) the term; 2) the properties or attributes that define the phenomenon; 3) the collection of phenomena covered by the concept. Problems with concepts: concepts are often unobservable and ambiguous in their meaning. Concepts often lack a precise and shared meaning (and can be viewed as political constructs) Solutions: narrow concepts down to a uni-dimensional form- lessening its properties or attributes.