Introduction to Empirical Methods in Political Science
PS 210
Fall 2025
Department of Political Science
Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences
Class meets:
Tuesday and Thursday, 9:30 to 10:50
Harris Hall L07
Tuesday, September 23rd: Prerecorded class session.
Thursday, October 2nd: Asynchronous activity in lieu of class meeting.
October 9th: First homework due.
October 16th: Midterm.
November 7th: Second homework due.
November 21st: Third homework due.
Monday, December 8th, 2:00 PM: Take-home final exam due.
This course provides an introduction to the empirical methods political scientists use to answer questions about politics, and the reasons why such methods matter. After exploring how hard it is to make good descriptive and causal inferences about politics, we will examine three basic strategies for overcoming the obstacles to reliable knowledge about the political world: experimentation, large N or quantitative studies (AKA statistics), and small N studies that use qualitative reasoning.
At the end of this course, you will be able to:
Understand and explain why descriptive and causal inference are difficult tasks in political science.
Identify possible weaknesses in academic or other descriptive and causal claims about politics.
Understand and explain the strengths and weaknesses of experimental research designs for causal inference about politics.
Understand and explain the strengths and weaknesses of survey and regression-based quantitative research designs for descriptive and causal inference about politics.
Understand and explain the strengths and weaknesses of qualitative methods for descriptive and causal inference about politics.
Apply all of these tools to critically evaluating examples of political science research.
Think about how empirical evidence matters to your own questions about politics.
Grades will be based on three homework assignments (30% total), a midterm (30% total), a final exam (30%), and participation (10%). Homework due dates will be set throughout the quarter. Students are encouraged to form study groups and work together but must complete and submit their own homework.
Late work will be accepted but with a grade penalty equivalent to 5% per day. Late exams will not be accepted without prior communication with the instructors or an overriding exemption due to university policy.
While some of the tools discussed in this course are based in sophisticated mathematical reasoning, our discussion of them will be posed at a primarily conceptual level. Hence, no particular mathematical or statistical background is expected for this course.
The textbook for this course, available for free online, is Empirical Methods in Political Science: An introduction, edited by Jean Clipperton. That text can be found at the library’s github. The textbook will be supplemented as needed with other readings available electronically.
Students enrolled in this course are required to complete a research participation assignment. This will involve taking part in studies conducted by students and faculty from the Department of Political Science, and will include up to 4 hours of research study participation. This will primarily require completing on-line surveys, and in some cases in-person studies at Scott Hall. Students will be able to see how political science studies are conducted and can request information about the studies at the end of the quarter. Students who prefer not to participate in research may opt for an alternative that entails reading a book chapter about political science research and writing a five page reaction paper. The typical chapter is about 20 pages and thus reading it and writing a five-page paper should take approximately four hours. In order to opt for the 5-page paper alternative, please email the lab manager, Jacob Fortier at jacobfortier2027@u.northwestern.edu.
This course follows the Northwestern University Syllabus Standards. Students are responsible for familiarizing themselves with this information.
This schedule is subject to changes (minor or major) depending on how long each topic actually takes us to cover, as well as on the needs of the class.
Sept. 16: Asking social science questions.
Clipperton, ed., Chapter 1.
Sept. 18: Data.
Clipperton, ed., Chapter 4.
Sept. 23: Causation.
Clipperton, ed., Chapter 2.
Please watch the video at the following week in place of attending class for Sept. 23: https://northwestern.zoom.us/rec/share/Q3kWcjscgQ3fimzNfRoWnOa3rOKADBBlKiyGO8ZFH1nSRsaultN4gTRdPRs4LaKU.Q-qeQC3Cr8yDNS89
Sept. 25: Causal inference in action.
Morral, Andrew R., and Rosanna Smart. “Concealed Carry Laws and Violence in America.” Annual Review of Criminology 9 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-criminol-032924-013352
Sept. 30: Experiments.
Clipperton, ed., Chapter 7.
Oct. 2: Applied experiments.
Activity: for a research question in the social sciences that interests you, suggest a design for an experiment that could be done as an honors thesis project. (You don’t have to actually intend to do it, etc., but it has to be the kind of thing that could hypothetically be done.) Explain why you find the topic interesting and how your design helps answer your question. Evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of your design in comparison with the example experiments linked above.
Please email your responses to the activity (which shouldn’t be more than a couple of pages double-spaced) to Professor Seawright!
Oct. 7: Sampling and survey research.
Clipperton, ed., Chapter 6.
Oct. 9: Confidence intervals and significance tests.
Clipperton, ed., Chapter 5.
Oct. 14: Correlation and regression.
Clipperton, ed., Chapter 8.
Oct. 16: Midterm
Oct. 21: Statistical computing in political science I.
Oct. 23: Quantitative political science research examples.
Oct. 28: Machine learning.
Clipperton, ed., Chapter 12.
Oct. 30: Statistical computing in political science II.
Nov. 4: Applied text methods and AI in social science.
Nov. 6: The qualitative comparative method.
Clipperton, ed., Chapter 9.
Nov. 11: Qualitative political science research examples.
Nov. 13: Qualitative computing tools in political science.
Nov. 18: Ethics and Normative Concerns in Political Science.
Ron Iphofen, Ethical Decision-Making in Social Research: A Practical Guide. 2009. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Chapter 1.
Nov. 20: Summary, review, and looking forward.