This study guide is a guide, not a contract.  All the material in the text, workbook, and lectures is fair game, regardless of whether it is explicitly mentioned here.  But this guide does honestly tell you what I consider most important.

The exam will be closed-book. It will consist entirely of definitions and essay questions. You will have a good deal of choice in the questions, although choice will be inversely proportional to the importance of the topic.

If you have the time, it is often useful to include information surrounding the core answer. Please note, however, that this does not mean a "data dump". Irrelevant information simply tells me that you've memorized lots of stuff, not that you understand the subject of the question.

To study efficiently:

• Check the syllabus (the current syllabus) to see what we've covered.
• Look at the W&B workbook and see whether you can answer all the questions on the material we've covered.  Imagine that the test consisted of questions like those:  could you pass it?  If you can, then rest assured that you can also pass any similar test I might throw at you.
• Review my online discussion of causality and particularly spurious relationships.  (It covers some other materials too, but we are concentrating on the criteria for causality now.)
• You are responsible for all assigned readings, regardless of whether they are covered in class. But (a) the readings / topics covered in class are the ones I consider the most important and thus most suitable for testing, and (b) you cannot be expected to have the same depth of understanding of those readings / topics we don't cover in class.

Here are some good questions to study.  Note that this list will be extended as we move along through the readings.

• Definitions: [Note that it will not be sufficient for you simply to have memorized Babbie's definition. You must understand how the concept is used and applied.]
  Anonymity (vs. confidentiality) of Ss
  • Artifact (a.k.a. social artifact)
  • Attributes (a.k.a. values)
  • Cohort study
• Conceptualization
• Correlation (a.k.a. association);  the empirical association criterion of causality
• Cross-sectional study
• Deductive theory
• Dependent variable (vs. independent variable)
• Hume's criteria for causation
• Hypothesis
• Idiographic (vs. nomothetic) research
• Inductive theory
• Informed consent
• Longitudinal study
• Operationalization
• Panel study
• Paradigm
• Replication
• Reproducability
• Spurious correlation / nonspuriousness criterion of causality
• Theory
• Time order criterion of causality
• Trend study
• Unit of analysis
• Variable
• Questions:
  • [See the second entry under "To study efficiently", above.]