QSSI NOVEMBER 1997: PRE-PROPOSAL AND COVER LETTER

Dear Provost Grey,

Enclosed is a pre-proposal for a Center for Quantitative Research in the Social Sciences.

The pre-proposal is signed by one faculty member from each of six departments in the Division of Social Sciences. In alphabetical order these departments are Anthropology, Economics, History, Political Science, Psychology and Sociology.

The pre-proposal followed from extensive discussions amongst the most quantitative faculty, in total eleven faculty, in these six departments. These faculty in turn discussed this pre-proposal with other quantitative faculty in their departments, and informed department chairs of the pre-proposal. In short we feel this pre-proposal is representative of the views of the more quantitative-oriented faculty in these departments.
 
 

1. CONCEPT STATEMENT: In the last decade a revolution has swept across the social sciences, as quantitative methods have become a critical, and in many cases the dominant, research paradigm. Scholars now employ quantitative techniques to examine a wide range of all social science subjects, including crime, war, relationships, cross-cultural equivalence of measures, elections, population dynamics, family strategies and economic performance. The approaches have so profoundly affected the nature of social science research that now the research of scholars in different departments that share similar methodological approaches may have as much, or more, in common as that conducted by their colleagues in traditional disciplines.

Not surprisingly, given this revolution, social science departments that emphasize methodology, such as many of those at UCSD, have experienced explosive growth in reputation. Faculty at the cutting edge of quantitative methodologies (who we call methodologists and includes, for example, econometricians and psychometricians) act as a lever to increase the quality and reputation of all quantitative social science faculty and programs by sharing their expertise with other faculty, graduate students, and undergraduate students. At the moment, however, Davis lags other institutions in terms of faculty specializing in quantitative social sciences methods. Significant gains can be achieved by hiring social science faculty equipped to teach and develop new quantitative techniques and by creating an interdisciplinary Center designed to facilitate, coordinate, and promote quantitative research in the social sciences at Davis.

2. RATIONALE

a1. Why this particular program?
Social science departments at UCD have a critical need for more methodologists. The proposed Center would create a cluster to attract and support top scholars. There has been tremendous growth in the variety of quantitative methods employed by social science researchers, and it is now impossible for any one department to have specialists and courses in all the critical techniques. As a result, enormous benefits would accrue from the coordination and training that an interdisciplinary center would provide.

a2. How is this different from what currently exists at Davis?
Despite the revolution in the use of quantitative methods, there has been resistance to hiring those faculty who could best enhance the methodological efforts of departments. Given the traditional, substantive, sub-field groupings within individual social science departments, there are often no incentives for a majority of department faculty to vote to hire methodologists. (Even Psychology and Economics, which have been more supportive of these types of faculty, have considerably fewer methodologists than peer universities). Aside from some minimal coordination among the three departments that use the Social Sciences Data Service, there is currently little coordination of courses and faculty.

a3. How does this relate to campus strengths?
We believe, and evidence from the recent NRC rankings support this assessment, that the best single way to increase rankings is to strengthen quantitative methods. Application of quantitative methods is the relative strength of many UCD social science departments. Some departments have methodologists, who are relatively young and high quality. But numbers are low, and some departments have no methodolgists.

b. Evaluation of critical mass

All departments involved already have in place successful users of quantitative methods. For example, in Political Science, all faculty hired in the 1990s are trained in quantitative methods. But the ability to apply a technique is different from the knowledge gained by those who develop them, and current faculty are keen to gain the assistance of methodologists. The few methodologists already present in the Division, Cameron (Economics) and Waller (Psychology, 1997 winner of the Catell Award for early career contributions to multivariate methods) provide a solid base for expansion in this direction, as does the Division of Statistics.

The Institute for Governmental Affairs provides a link between most of the departments concerned and is willing to minimize overhead costs through affiliation with the Center.

c. Impact on undergraduate education.

We propose both a major and minor in social science quantitative methods.

Current incorporation of quantitative methods into social sciences undergraduate education is close to nonexistent. Relatively few students in social sciences use, for example, Excel or do any sort of data analysis throughout their degree at Davis. This lacuna in their education limits their ability to obtain jobs, puts them at a severe disadvantage in graduate school, and denies them the skills necessary for being effective democratic citizens (i.e., being able to understand polls and ballot initiatives). With sufficient qualified faculty in place, plus the necessary computer and teaching assistant support, we could provide social science undergraduates necessary quantitative research skills.

d. Impact on graduate education.

We propose a graduate group in social science quantitative methods, a designated emphasis in social science quantitative methods and possibly a stand-alone masters in social science quantitative methods.

Demonstrative methodological skills are now a requirement for those social science graduate students looking for employment, both at research universities and in non-academic jobs. As a result, social science graduate programs are teaching more and more quantitative classes. And many more Ph.D. theses involve the use of quantitative methods that require a methodologist on the committee. Students would have access to scholars skilled in the techniques appropriate for answering their questions, rather than drawing upon necessarily more limited departmental resources.

e. Impact on research and scholarship.

The impact could not be higher. As noted earlier, quantitative methods have become the dominant paradigm in most social science departments - a fact reflected by trends in both recent hiring and publications in the disciplines’ top journals and presses. In our view, nothing could have greater and wider impact on the ability of current Davis social science faculty to be more productive than the hiring of new faculty who are trained in state of the art methodologies. In addition, methodologists tend to be effective at bringing in grants and resources that improve the research infrastructure for all faculty.

In addition the Center would provide a forum for faculty to hold workshops to teach new skills, and to provide an arena for the presentation and discussion of interdisciplinary work.

f. Impact on service.

The service contributions of methodologists run high, as they are the best equipped to evaluate quantitative work. Typical expectations include service on any recruiting / thesis or computing committee and writing letters of recommendation for anything involving application of quantitative methods. These demands are in addition to the usual ones expected of faculty members.

g. Potential for outreach.

A relatively high proportion of outreach work is of an applied nature, involving the use of advanced quantitative methods.

3. COMPARISON INSTITUTIONS

These schools are known for strength in coordinating and promoting quantitative research among their social science programs: University of Michigan, University of Illinois - Urbana/Champaign, UCLA, UCSD, University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill.

4. RESOURCES NEEDED

4a. Faculty
At this first round (the next five years) we request 6 FTE affiliated with the Center.
These six FTE comprise one FTE based in each of the following departments (in alphabetical order):

Faculty would be housed in individual departments.
The Center would require two offices (staff & director) and access to a shared conference room.

4c. Staff

One person, primarily to handle undergraduate major, graduate group and designated emphasis.
Budget through another group, with IGA as the most obvious contender.

4d. Research Fund

A research fund of $10,000 to fund seminars and/or conference.

4e. Computer Equipment

For the social sciences to move ahead, regardless of the outcome of this proposal, students require greatly increased access to computers. This issue should be well advertised following the report released by the Provosts Committee on the Future of Information Technology. We endorse strongly their recommendations which we understand are for greatly increased number of computers in labs.

4f. Teaching Assistants

There will also need to be a reallocation of teaching assistants. In many departments a course needs at least 100 students to warrant a TA. Quantitative methods courses require a much greater commitment of TA’s than this.

4g: Future

The revolution is over and quantitative methods are here to stay. Future considerations include required quantitative methods courses for all social science undergraduate students and the development of core courses for graduate students. A Center supporting interdisciplinary quantitative methods would greatly improve the ability of the social sciences at Davis to support high quality, nationally recognized, research and teaching programs.

Colin Cameron (Economics, proposal contact)
Diane Felmlee  (Sociology)
Ted Margadant  (History)
Randolph Siverson (Political Science)
William Skinner (Anthropology)
Niels Waller  (Psychology)