3: Conceptualisation and Measurement in the Real World Flashcards
What are the complications of the real world?
- Forming a systematised concept.
- When attributes are concepts.
- Atrribute or predictor?
- Redundancy.
- Conflation.
- Measurement.
- Missing data.
Why is forming a systematised concept difficult?
Different conceptualisations of one concept is possible.
How is the conceptualisation of democracy different in Africa compared to the western liberal model? (Forming a systematised concept)
Africa - most societies are pre-industrial and communal, diff culture - therefore their conceptualisation would be diff to the west. Do not separate political democracy from economic well being.
West - economic prosperity is not an attribute of democracy - but is is for Africa.
Which defintion do you choose? (Forming a systematised concept)
Depends on the objective of your research.
What is the hypothesis of modernisation theory? (Forming a systematised concept)
The higher the level of economic development = higher the level of democracy in a country.
What is the process of modernisation theory? (Forming a systematised concept)
Country develops, agarian > industrialised, brings people closer in factories, better communication, higher wages, m/c, m/c will demand a say in politics.
What is economic development lead to according to modernisation theory? (Forming a systematised concept)
Economic development = western liberal democracy.
If you wanted to test this theory in Africa - we would use a systematised concept of western liberal democracy - end point of modernisation. It can be compared with other literature.
Which def would you use when describing the level of democracy in Africa? (Forming a systematised concept)
A def of democracy that is Africa-specific can be used. Africans do not necessarily aspire for a western liberal democracy.
Why is a difficult when attributes are concepts?
Need to do a conceptualisation of a conceptualisation. Need to add sub-attributes to attributes of the concept. e.g. economic development atrributes (health + edu) - are concepts themselves.
Why is it difficult to decide when something is an attribute or a predictor?
Democracy - is economic development and attribute or predictor? Western liberal democracy - predictor, African democracy - attribute.
What is an independent variable? (Attribute or predictor?)
Influences or helps us predict the level of a dependent variable. It is often treated as fixed or given in statistical analysis, also called an explanatory variable.
What is a dependent variable? (Attribute or predictor?)
Dependent through statistical or stochastic process on the value of an independent variable.
What is redundancy?
A situation in which variables do not tap into mutually exclusive (sub-) attributes.
How is there redundancy in western liberal democracy? (Redundancy)
Western liberal democracy - attribute: participation. Participation has 2 sub-attributes: 1. extent to which people are allowed to vote, 2. extent to which people make use of their right - turnout. Both are the same - extent of vote.
What is conflation? + example
A variable does not belong to the atrribute in question, but to a diff one. e.g. health - info on how many signed off sick per year - may think this relates to longevity - people who are sick often, die earlier. This info relates to a diff attribute - absence of disease.
