MPA 610: RESEARCH METHODS

Emphasizing the skills of data analysis and statistical inference, this course explores key issues in understanding and applying modern research to public management and policy making, including the use of theory and models, identifying causes, experiments and quasi experiments, the logic of control variables and the interpretation of multiple regression, measurement concepts and methods, qualitative methods, and sampling. The emphasis is on learning these ideas through practice with many different examples of real-world research and empirical evidence. Ethical, political, and other contextual factors will be integrated.