Essentials of political research / Alan D. Monroe.

List of Tables and Figures -- Preface -- 1. The Scientific Study of Research Questions -- What Does It Mean to Be Scientific? -- Distinguishing Empirical and Normative Questions -- Reformulating Normative Questions as Empirical -- Research Questions -- The Scientific Research Process -- Exercises -- Suggested Answers to Exercises -- 2. Building Blocks of the Research Process -- Theories, Hypotheses, and Operational Definitions: An Overview -- Types of Hypotheses -- Theoretical Role -- Units of Analysis -- Operational Definitions -- Exercises -- Suggested Answers to Exercises -- 3. Research Design -- The Concept of Causality -- Types of Research Design -- Exercises -- Suggested Answers to Exercises -- 4. Published Data Sources -- The Internet as Data Source -- The Importance of Units of Analysis -- Strategies for Finding Data Sources -- Some General Data Sources -- Demographic Data -- Political and Governmental Data for Nations -- Data on U.S. Government and Politics -- Survey Data -- Content Analysis -- Steps in Content Analysis -- Issues in Content Analysis -- Exercises -- Suggested Answers to Exercises -- 5. Survey Research -- Sampling -- Interviewing -- Writing Survey Items -- Exercises -- Suggested Answers to Exercises -- 6. Statistics: An Introduction -- Levels of Measurement -- Univariate Statistics -- The Concept of Relationship -- Multivariate Statistics -- Exercises -- Suggested Answers to Exercises -- 7. Graphic Display of Data -- Graphics for Univariate Distributions -- Graphics for Multivariate Relationships -- How Not to Lie with Graphics -- The Need for Standardization -- Principles for Good Graphics -- Exercises -- Suggested Answers to Exercise A -- 8. Nominal and Ordinal Statistics -- Correlations for Nominal Variables -- Correlations for Ordinal Variables -- Chi-Square: A Significance Test -- Additional Correlations for Nominal Variables -- Interpreting Contingency Tables Using Statistics -- Exercises -- Suggested Answers to Exercises -- 9. Interval Statistics -- The Regression Line -- Pearson's r -- Nonlinear Relationships -- Relationships Between Interval and Nominal Variables -- Exercises -- Suggested Answers to Exercises -- 10. Multivariate Statistics -- Controlling with Contingency Tables -- What Can Happen When You Control -- Controlling with Interval Variables: Partial Correlations -- The Multiple Correlation -- Significance Test for R[superscript 2] -- Beta Weights -- Causal Interpretation -- Exercises -- Suggested Answers to Exercises -- References -- Index.