STV4030A – Digital Data in Political Science
Schedule, syllabus and examination date
Course content
In this course, you will learn to use modern computational tools to collect, organize, analyze, and visualize political science data in an efficient and effective manner. You will learn best practice for documenting all stages of the process, making your results fully reproducible. Moreover, you will be introduced to relevant data-protection regulation, ethical aspects concerning political data science, and the steps you need to take in order to ensure that your research is in compliance and ethically sound.
Over the course, you will learn how to search for documents online, download and merge existing datasets, scrape websites for relevant data, interact with APIs, extract text from pdfs, use OCR on historical document collections, and organize and summarize large corpuses of text.
Learning outcome
After having completed the course, the students have acquired the following knowledge, skills and general competencies:
Knowledge
You will:
- be able to identify potential digital data-sources and develop strategies for collecting these
- learn best practices for documenting the data-collection process
- learn how to make your research fully reproducible
- be aware of data-protection regulations and how to comply with it
Skills
You will:
- master several different digital data-collection techniques
- know how to organize and document large quantities of data
- be able to write R-code to automate all relevant stages of the research process
- be able to create effective visualizations of the results for your analysis
- be able to communicate academic knowledge in writing and orally
General competencies
You will:
- become equipped to reflect upon ethical dilemmas arising in political data science
- be able to design digital research projects that are in compliance with data-protection regulations
- learn how to effectively collect, manage, analyze, and visualize digitally collected data
Admission to the course
Students must be enrolled in the master programmes in Political science.
Recommended previous knowledge
STV4021 – 亚博娱乐官网_亚博pt手机客户端登录sdesign i statsvitenskap and STV4022 – Anvendt statistikk for statsvitenskap?or PECOS4025 – Analytic perspectives on peace and conflict and PECOS4022 – Applied Statistics for Peace and Conflict Studies?or?equivalent.
Teaching
Lectures.?
Hackathon-style seminars where students may cooperate to solve a political data science challenge. Ahead of the seminar, you will be exposed to a combination of short video lectures, online tutorials and readings in order to be prepared to attempt the weekly challenge. Absence from compulsory
Compulsory activities
Attend at least seven of ten seminars.?
Absence from compulsory activities: For many courses, UiO requires participation in the form of compulsory activities. These must be approved before you can sit for the examination. If you are ill or have another valid reason for being absent from compulsory activities, your absence may be approved or the compulsory activity may be postponed. Report absence from or the need for a postponed deadline on a compulsory activity Absence from compulsory activities - University of Oslo (uio.no)
Examination
Portfolio exam.?
You must have passed the compulsory activities in order to sit the exam.?
Language of examination
The examination text is given in English. You may submit your response in Norwegian, Swedish, Danish or English.
Grading scale
Grades are awarded on a pass/fail scale. Read more about?the grading system.
More about examinations at UiO
- Use of sources and citations
- Special exam arrangements due to individual needs
- Withdrawal from an exam
- Illness at exams / postponed exams
- Explanation of grades and appeals
- Resitting an exam
- Cheating/attempted cheating
You will find further guides and resources at the web page on examinations at UiO.