POL687

040475

In this course, you will learn how to design, implement, and analyze experiments in political science. The course is loosely organized into three sections. We will start by considering experimental design discussing the key virtues of experimental research and then how to best achieve strong experiments in practice. The second unit focuses on the varieties of experiments common to political science including laboratory experiments, natural experiments, field experiments, and survey experiments. We will consider the characteristics of each, and along the way, address some of the challenges associated with the implementation of experiments, such as attrition, effective randomization, and spillover effects. The third section is devoted to the empirical analysis of experimental results. We will cover the analytical tools common to experimental research and address issues of mediation as well as heterogeneous treatment effects. Throughout the semester, each student will design an experiment related to your own particular substantive interests. We will use parts of each class session to give each other feedback on how to improve that design (against the backdrop of the particular topic we are covering).

GRD - Regular Grades A, B, C, D, E

Graduate