Political Science 3000
Political Analysis
Final Paper Assignment
Data Analysis Paper
Objective: The purpose of this assignment is to bring together all of the elements that we have learned throughout the course and put them to work in a single empirical work testing your OWN hypothesis. Simply replicating an analysis from a previous assignment is NOT acceptable.
Task:
- Choose at least two variables from one of the SPSS Datasets to serve as a dependent variable and independent variable(s).
- Develop a hypothesis for an expected relationship between your dependent variable and your independent variable(s).
- Test each hypothesis using the appropriate method for your variables.
- Include in your analysis at least one control variable.
- Write up a typewritten paper (4-6 double-spaced pages in length, not including tables) covering the following details:
- Your research question
- Your concepts and conceptual definitions
- Your operationalizations
- Your hypothesis, along with your theoretical justification for your hypothesis.
- (Be sure to also include a discussion of the control variable(s) you introduce and why you think they are important)
- A brief discussion of the particular method/statistics you are using to test your hypothesis
- A presentation of your results (in tables using the proper form as presented in Canvas Reading 5), along with a discussion of those results
- Whether you perform your analysis using crosstabulation or regression, you MUST include typewritten tables in your paper using the proper format as presented in your Canvas Reading 5.
- Simply copying and pasting SPSS output as your tables is NOT acceptable.
- Your conclusions
Your paper will be graded on style and content. It should be in the form of a single coherent essay, rather than a series of short answers to each of the above questions. Your paper will NOT be graded on the significance of your results. Don't worry if your hypotheses are not borne out in the data. If you have provided a reasonable justification for why you thought your hypothesis would be true, then failing to find significant relationships is not a problem. It just means there was no evidence to support your hypothesis. However, if you do not find support for your hypothesis, it may be an inidication of a deeper problem (like a validity issue with one or more of your variables). So be sure to exercise care in selecting your variables, because I will be judging your paper based on the validity of your measures.
Plagiarism will not be tolerated: use your own words.
Due: Submit your paper via Canvas by the due date listed in Canvas. Late papers NOT be accepted.