Syllabus:  Spring 2010
(50:920:301) Methods and Techniques of Social Research  

Instructor:  Ted Goertzel   Office:  405 Cooper Street, Room 110.  Enter from the back of the building on Lawrence Street.    Office phone: 856 225-2714   email: goertzel@camden.rutgers.edu.  To find my home page type "Ted Goertzel" in Google or another search engine.

Teaching Assistant:  Ekaterina Kaynarova, email kaynarov@camden.rutgers.edu

This is an introductory course in the methods and techniques of social research as used in criminal justice, sociology and related fields. This course is a prerequisite for Ethics and Policy in Criminal Justice and Theories of Crime and Delinquency.

It is helpful if students have had at least an introductory course in sociology or criminal justice before taking this course.  Prior work in statistics is not required.  Topics include research design, conceptualization and measurement, sampling, experiments, survey research, evaluation research, quantifying data, scale construction, making graphs and data analysis.  Particular emphasis is placed on survey research and on time series analysis of trend data. 

 Specific objectives of this course are:
1. To learn enough about social research to be able to read original research reports published in social science journals.
2. To learn how to design questionnaires, collect survey data, and analyze the data.
3. To learn how to analyze data from published statistical sources such as The Statistical Abstract of the United States.
4. To learn how to use statistical software packages and how to access statistical data on the World Wide Web.
5. To learn how to make graphs of statistical data.
6. To develop skills in the logical and empirical analysis of social problems.
7. To learn how computerized statistics data ("CompStat") can be used in lowering crime rates and managing other social problems  

This class meets Monday and Wednesday from 1:20 to 2:40 in 121 Armitage.  Weekly quizzes and occasional written assignments will be posted online in SAKAI.  To find them, log onto SAKAI, look for the tab for our course, and click on "Assignments & Materials." If you have taken many SAKAI courses before, you may have to rearrange your tabs to see our course.  Click on the My Workspace tab and on Membership to see all your courses.  Click on Preferences and Customize Tabs to set SAKAI so that your current courses appear at the top of the page.

There will be a weekly research or statistics assignment and  two versions of each weekly quiz.  The "early bird" version of the quiz will close promptly at 12:20 p.m. on Monday of each week.  The "last chance" version will close promptly at 12:20 p.m. on Wednesday.  The weekly assignment will close at 5 p.m. on Tuesday each week.  (unless announced otherwise on the weekly assignment page.) The two versions of the quizzes will be similar, but may not be exactly the same.  The highest of your two quiz scores will count.  If you miss the "early bird" quiz, your "last chance" score will count.  You should plan to take each quiz at least a few hours before it closes in case technical difficulties arise with SAKAI or with your computer.  If you wait until the very last minute, you are assuming the risk of technical difficulties.  If you have trouble with a quiz, you should bring it up in class on the same day or, if you cannot come to class, email the instructor at goertzel@camden.rutgers.edu by 5 p.m. of the same day.  If you are home sick, you should take the quiz from home.  Late quizzes will not be accepted because of ordinary illnesses that do not require hospitalization or because of deaths in the family, weather problems, family emergencies, etc.  The convenience of 24/7 internet service should allow you to keep up with the work despite these problems.   All problems with quizzes and assignments must be resolved within 24 hours of the due date

The textbook for this course will be Understanding Research by W. Lawrence Neuman.    This book can be accessed in three ways:

1. You can purchase it as a paperback book.  It will be ordered at the campus bookstore and is also available from the publisher, or from amazon.com, Barnes and Noble, and other booksellers.  Some used copies are available online.  The list price is $67.50.  This gets you a convenient bound volume with color graphics that may be more appealing than reading online.  Of course, you can keep the book for reference or recover part of the cost by selling it at the end of the term.
   
2. You can buy a 180 day subscription to the electronic edition of the text for $33.60.  The content and illustrations are identical.  This allows you to read the book on a computer, and to print out pages, up to 10 pages at a time.  The electronic texts are also searchable.  There are two kinds of electronic texts, both of which cost the same:   Click Here for Access to Online or Downloadable Subscriptions.
1. An online subscription allows you to read the book on any computer that is connected to the internet.  You do not need to install any software on your computer.  You can also get a refund within 14 days if you have not read or printed more than 20% of the book.  If you have reliable broadband service at home or wherever you will be studying, this may be the best electronic option.  Since this is on the Internet, it should work with any operating system.  You can try out the interface online before buying.  You can also read it on an iPod Touch or iPhone, but you may need to update the operating system  (download the CourseSmart app from the iTunes store).
2. A downloadable subscription allows you to install the book on one computer.  You can then read it without having to be connected to the Internet.  But you can only read it on that one computer.  There are no refunds for downloadble subscriptions, if your computer should break down, I believe you would need to subscribe again, just as you would need to buy a paper book again if you lost it.