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Political Methodology

Purdue Political Science scholars contribute to the field of political methodology by studying existing tools and developing new approaches to extracting meaning from empirical data. This field encompasses research designs and methods for quantitative and qualitative analysis, as well as formal theory and its implications for empirical testing.

Recent research by department faculty has appeared in leading journals, including Political Analysis, American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, Political Science Research and Methods, Nature Human Behaviour, PLOS ONE, and Public Opinion Quarterly, among others.

Areas of Strength

Department faculty specialize in a broad range of methodological approaches, including:

  • Survey research for mass and elite populations
  • Experimental methods
  • Causal inference
  • Qualitative content analysis
  • Computational and AI methods for social science
    • Audio and video analytics
    • Machine learning and natural language processing (NLP)
    • Complex modeling
    • Remote sensing using satellite data
  • Latent variable analysis
  • Expert-based measurement of political and social concepts
  • Process tracing
  • Formal theory and bargaining models

Research Labs and Programs

The Methodology Center at Purdue

The Methodology Center is a cross-college initiative that brings together scholars in the behavioral, health, and social sciences to strengthen methodological expertise and expand opportunities for collaboration. The center also offers a certificate program for graduate students.

Computational Social Science Lab

The Computational Social Science Lab examines mass and elite behavior, with a particular focus on data from nontraditional sources, including audio and video. Current projects use resources such as the C-SPAN Archives, political advertisements, social media, and traffic-camera footage of pedestrian interactions.

JMK Social Science Lab

The JMK Social Science Lab is a collaborative facility in the College of Liberal Arts managed by the Departments of Political Science and Sociology. It provides dedicated research space and advanced facilities for conducting experiments and supporting collaborative research.

Faculty