Selected Topics in American Government: Public Opinion and Survey Research

Opinion surveys are nearly ubiquitous in public life today.  What are surveys, how do we conduct them, what can they tell us (and fail to tell us), and what is their relevance to legal and social research?  This seminar is a skills-based workshop geared to train students to critically consume and generate survey data.  Key topics we will cover include: the history of the concept of public opinion; historical approaches to survey research methods; the role of public opinion in the courts; understanding sampling theory and questionnaire design; learning about different modes of interviewing and alternatives to opinion surveys; reading texts that discuss public opinion and use survey data; primary analysis of survey data.   Students are expected to design a survey and write a research paper for the class.