Yale Introduces Summer Program on Social Science Experimentation

The Institution for Social and Policy Studies (ISPS) at Yale University is launching a summer program of instruction in social science experimentation to academic researchers and non-academics from a variety of fields.

The three-day workshop will offer participants basic grounding in designing, implementing and analyzing field experiments in a real world setting. Among the topics covered will be the various applications of social science experimentation, data analysis and model experiments. The last session of the program will give participants the opportunity to discuss their own proposals for field experiments with peers and experts.

Its interdisciplinary approach, combining the theoretical and the practical in an accessible format, is meant to draw participants from a broad range of professions and backgrounds and from the public and the private sectors of the economy. Those involved in such disparate fields as advertising, public policy making, political campaigns and the criminal justice system will find the program advantageous.

“Randomized experiments are the most exciting thing right now in social research. This method enables researchers to draw reliable inferences about questions that really matter, questions of immediate practical significance,” notes Donald Green, one of the instructors of the program.

The program is also taught by Yale political science professors Alan Gerber and John Lapinski. The three instructors are each experienced in designing and conducting social science experiments. Gerber is an expert on political campaigns and congressional districting. Green, who is the director of ISPS, has published work on campaign financing, party affiliation and hate crimes. He has collaborated with Gerber on more than a dozen experiments relating voter turnout to direct mail, telephoning and door-to-door canvassing. Lapinski specializes in American politics, history, public opinion and quantitative methods. He conducted a groundbreaking experiment with interactive television during the 2000 election and is currently working on web-based surveys with such companies as MSNBC on the Internet and TheStreet.com.

The Yale Corporation established ISPS in 1968 to stimulate interdisciplinary collaboration in the social sciences within the university and to facilitate research into important public policy arenas. Faculty and students from many departments and programs within the university-including its graduate and professional schools-are involved in a variety of activities, such as interdisciplinary faculty seminars; research publications; postdoctoral programs; and the undergraduate major in Ethics, Politics and Economics. Through these activities, ISPS seeks to shape public policies of local, national, and international significance.

The Experiments in the Social Sciences Program will be held on the Yale campus in New Haven, Connecticut, July 26-28. Enrollment is limited to 28, and applications must be in by June 1.

For more information or to receive an application, contact Donald Green at 203-432-3234; e-mail: ispsyale@minerva.cis.yale.edu; or visit the ISPS web site: http://www.yale.edu/isps/