by Jack Santucci
If you are a college student, this post is for you.
Is your paper longer than the word limit? Is your thesis statement just a list of points you plan to cover in the body paragraphs (i.e., “listy”)? Do you have a gut sense that the paper’s structure might be “off”?
Read more…I have a new paper (open access) with Josh Dyck in Public Opinion Quarterly:
How should we measure “pure” or “true” independents? For years, the respective item required a respondent to volunteer that answer. Recent surveys have moved toward presenting it explicitly. Those that do produce estimates of pure independents that are much larger than in past surveys. We present evidence of this phenomenon across multiple surveys and ask: Are self-administered surveys overcounting independents, or are traditional live-interviewer surveys undercounting independents? We answer that question by comparing live-interview and self-administered samples from the 2012 and 2016 American National Election Studies, by undertaking tests to rule out mode effects (including an experiment), and by seeing which question wording correlates more strongly with measures of latent ideology, vote choice, and ratings of the parties. Our findings suggest that surveys that include an explicit response option, allowing Americans to self-identify easily as “(pure) independent,” offer a more precise measurement of the concept of party identification. This has implications for the study of independents, as well as for discussions about polarization and party-system dealignment.
Giving feedback on student writing is an opportunity to think about teaching. One issue I see often is a weak thesis statement. This usually takes the form of a list of concepts rather than a straightforward answer to the question in a prompt. Students get here by writing body paragraphs in author-by-author fashion, “wrapping” these in listy thesis statements, then thinking the job is done. In short, students are writing body paragraphs to arrive at their theses — all while worrying about meeting some word count. I want to suggest the idea of a “definitions paragraph” as a way to break these habits. I think it can do so by getting students to think about the readings’ main points in an integrative way.
Read more…Paper season is upon us, and I am giving feedback on students’ drafts. They are pretty good so far. Most of my comments concern paragraph and essay organization. As this very useful website notes, “Rational, skimming readers do not treat all parts of paragraphs in the same way.”
Read more…In his famous essay on belief systems, Converse (1964, 8-10) writes about how involvement in a group can cause attitude constraint. He says this process involves learning two separate things: “what goes with what” and “why.” He then speculates that the second form of learning (why) will happen more slowly than the first. Based on what we’ve read so far, as well as personal experience, do you think he is right about the order in which people (a) bundle issue positions and (b) get ready to explain why those positions should be bundled?
Please give your answer in 3-5 pages, double-spaced. Remember that less can be “more” if circumstances call for it. The rubric I will use is here. I can imagine answers in both directions.