HomeWork #1 STATISTICAL DESCRIPTION Due, through TurnItIn, by Friday, April 27, 11:59 PM.
Do Not try to submit this a few minutes before the deadline. You may need a few minutes for the submission to go through properly. Make sure you follow and complete each step.
• Look at the following list of variables. All of you will, throughout the quarter, use the following two as your Dependent Variables (DV):
V16 Feeling Thermometer Clinton V17 Feeling Thermometer Trump
Feeling thermometers ask survey respondents to rate candidates on a 0 to 100-degree scale. ‘0’ means, well, they are viewed extremely negatively, ‘100’ extremely positive, with ‘50’ generally indicating neutrality. It was rather amazing to see what percentage of respondents gave Clinton (21.8%) and Trump (31.8%) a rating of ‘0’, and how low the percentage of totality neutral (50°=4.8%/5.1%) and totally positive (100°=5.8°/5.6°) responses were. Comparable ratings for then President Obama (V15) were 15.7% (0), 4.7% (50) and 14.9% (100).
• Now choose one (1) of the following eight Independent Variables (IV) that you will also use throughout the quarter. One of these variables is already binary/dichotomous (2 categories), but others hav
e more than 2 categories, including other feeling thermometers that have a potential 101 (0-100) categories. To place all of you on an even playing field, I have converted (recoded) all these variables into dichotomies. Each is listed at the end of your data file with its original designation (V22A, V81, etc.) supplemented by ‘_30D’ (see the revised CODEBOOK). (1) List the IV that you have chosen.
Demographic IVs V3_30D Hispanic origin or not (already a dichotomy) V4_30D Age (Millennials vs Baby Boomers + (Generation X removed) Issue IVs V22A_30D Favor/oppose ACA (‘neither favor nor opposed’ excluded) V42E_30D Environment increase/decrease funding (‘decrease’% too small—combined
with ‘keep the same’) V47_30D Gun ownership (easier + keep same/ decrease) Feeling thermometers Totally neutral (50°) can be rather substantial here. Only those with a leaning are
included in the first two variables as ‘neutrals’ can be a form of ‘Bradley Effect’ response. The new categories are (1=0 to 49°) (2=51 to 100°). The percentage of negative ratings for SCIENTISTS is extremely low and thus were added to neutrals (0-50°).
V79_30D Illegal Immigrants V81_30D Muslims V81S_30D Scientists (yes, scientists)