Monthly Archives: January 2011

Metadata>paradata. Discuss.

Posted on January 28, 2011 by Vicki Bolton

Today’s S3RI methodology seminar was given by Gabi Durrant and Julia D’Arrigo.  The subject was paradata, which I’m pretty sure is data which describes the process of survey data collection.  It might be data about the person conducting the interviews, or … Continue reading →

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Values and conflict in the voluntary sector

Posted on January 28, 2011 by Vicki Bolton

Malin Arvidson, who is part of the Third Sector Research Centre, gave a seminar yesterday about some of the work she has been doing on the Real Times project.  The Real Times project is longitudinal (which means that it follows people … Continue reading →

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Time-varying covariates III

Posted on January 21, 2011 by Vicki Bolton

A thought occurs.  Longitudinal data allows change to be studied within individuals was well as within populations.  This is ‘a good thing’.  You can look at whether a training programme affected an individual’s employment status, for example.  Or whether breakfast … Continue reading →

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Population projection – and it’s depressing

Posted on January 19, 2011 by Vicki Bolton

My take-home message from today was slightly depressing.  Sure, women do indeed live longer than men – but they live nearly all of those extra years with a disability.  Sigh…  I have a lingering interest in long-term care (for which … Continue reading →

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Scaremongering journalist…? Not this time.

Posted on January 14, 2011 by Vicki Bolton

I’ve just been reading a Guardian article about a BMJ article about exclusive breastfeeding for six months.  As a member of a university, I’m privileged to have access to many journals online, including the BMJ.  I used that privilege to … Continue reading →

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Time-varying covariates II

Posted on January 12, 2011 by Vicki Bolton

My division runs a reading group.  The subject is always methodological – this semester it’s a textbook on longitudinal data analysis (“Applied Longitudinal Data Analysis: Modeling Change and Event Occurrence” by Singer and Willett, for those who are interested).  The … Continue reading →

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Bandwagon vs. threshold

Posted on January 8, 2011 by Vicki Bolton

I saw an interesting presentation by Helen Margetts from the Oxford Internet Institute at Southampton last month.  Her research suggests a threshold effect for political participation.  Under her experimental conditions, people were statistically significantly more likely to participate politically (in this case, … Continue reading →

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Great post from the Harvard blog

Posted on January 7, 2011 by Vicki Bolton

Matt Blackwell at the Harvard Social Science Statistics Blog draws attention (in a most amusing way) to this interesting NY Times article.  Worth a read.  Basically, a professor with “a great sense of humour” (Daryl J. Bem) claims to have demonstrated … Continue reading →

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Time-varying covariates

Posted on January 7, 2011 by Vicki Bolton

In an analysis of longitudinal data, you find variables which change over time (e.g. marital status) and those that do not (e.g. date of birth).  I was forced to think about the place of time-varying covariates in longitudinal data analysis … Continue reading →

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Founding the Confounding Factor

Posted on January 6, 2011 by Vicki Bolton

What is a confounding factor? According to the Oxford English Dictionary, confounding is “destroying, confusing, perplexing, amazing, etc”.  In statistics, a confounding factor or variable worms its way between your carefully chosen cause and effect, making a nonsense of your research … Continue reading →

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