https://www.icpsr.umich.edu/icpsrweb/
An international consortium of more than 750 academic institutions and research organizations, Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR) provides leadership and training in data access, curation, and methods of analysis for the social science research community.
ICPSR maintains a data archive of more than 250,000 files of research in the social and behavioral sciences. It hosts 21 specialized collections of data in education, aging, criminal justice, substance abuse, terrorism, and other fields.
ICPSR collaborates with a number of funders, including U.S. statistical agencies and foundations, to create thematic data collections and data stewardship and research projects.
Resources for Students:
Learning Support
- How to Read a Journal Article - Tips and tricks to make reading and understanding social science journal articles easier.
- A Guide to Interpreting SPSS Output - How to interpret frequency distributions, crosstabulations, comparison of means tests, correlations, and OLS regressions done in SPSS. Used in teaching undergraduate Introduction to Statistics course.
- Data Citations - Citing data is as important as citing literature used in a paper. This is a discussion of why it is important and how to properly cite data.
- Data Management Plans - Guidelines for effective data management, most useful for graduate students and faculty beginning research projects for the first time. Information given responds to the requirements of federal funding agencies such as the National Institutes of Health and National Science Foundation.
Research Paper Competition
The ICPSR Research Paper Competition is an annual event open to undergraduate and graduate students and recent graduates. The competition seeks to highlight exemplary student research papers based on quantitative analysis of ICPSR data. Each of the four competition categories addresses a particular research topic and has specific eligibility requirements for entry. Awards include cash prizes and publication in the ICPSR Bulletin for first-place winners and on the ICPSR website for all winners.
Summer Undergraduate Internship Program
The ICPSR summer internship program provides undergraduate students with a unique and expansive experience that introduces all aspects of social science research and includes supported exploration of a research query from start to finish, "hands on" data management, and focused methodological training in quantitative research. The internship program is excellent preparation for advanced studies and careers in social science research.
Summer Program in Quantitative Methods of Social Research
The Summer Program provides a comprehensive, integrated program of studies, statistics, data analysis, and social science methodology. Its instructional environment stresses integration of methods of quantitative analysis within a broader context of substantive social research. The Summer Program takes place from early June to late August and most classes are held at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor.
Webinars and Tutorials
The ICPSR YouTube Channel presents Webinars and tutorials on accessing and using ICPSR resources. The Webinars cover a variety of topics, including finding what you want on the ICPSR website, analyzing ICPSR data online, creating setup files for SPSS, debugging SAS, SPSS, and Stata code, etc.
Using Resources for Instructors
While the materials in the Resources for Instructors are intended to support faculty, students wishing to sharpen their research skills or explore a variety of research topics are welcome to make use of these resources. Data-Driven Learning Guides demonstrate questions of interest to social scientists using real data and predefined analyses. Exercise Sets are sequenced activities that build toward a stated learning goal.
