Five Rules for the Public Practice of Professional Social Science' A Case Study and a journey' Peter

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Five Rules for the Public Practice of
Professional Social Science. A Case Study and
a journey.Peter Davis, Sociology
COMPASS(Centre of Methods and Policy
Application in the Social Sciences -
www.compass.auckland.ac.nz)

• Making Connections Series
• IPS and ASSR, Rutherford House
• 24 August 2009

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5 Rules A Journey

• WHERE I am now.
• WHY I have come here.
• HOW I got there.
• WHAT we do now

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Five Rules for the Public Practice of a
Professional Social Science

• Engage with public actors and issues
• Conduct strategic research and publish it
• Save your data and make it available to others
• Link your work to broad analytical frameworks
• Use advanced methods that generate insights

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Organisational model for Public Practice of
Professional Social Science
Creating Knowledge
COMPASS Advisory Board
Engaging Communities
Sharing Data
Building Skills
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5 Rules A Journey

• WHERE I am now.
• WHY I have come here.
• HOW I got there.
• WHAT we do now

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Types of Social Science Practice
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Research Payback CriteriaModified
Buxton/Hanney Framework

• Research transfer
• Enhanced University external engagement
• Knowledge production
• Peer-reviewed publications and other outputs
• Research capacity building
• New opportunities, PhDs, staff development
• Informing policy (and product/service)
• Provided, influenced, produced policy change
• Sector and broader benefits
• Used in service/product delivery, produced
  changes

Semester 1, 2009
Five Rules for Social Science
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Research Evidence in Health Policy Lavis et
al., 2008, Implementation Science

• Recommendations to assist use of research
  evidence
• Collaborate with other organisations
• Link with policy makers, involve stakeholders
• Be independent and manage conflicts of interest
• Build capacity among those working with you
• Use good methods and be transparent in work
• Start small, identify clear audience and scope,
  and address important questions
• Be attentive to implementation

Semester 1, 2009
Five Rules for Social Science
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Ecology of the Social Sciences

• The context and the purposes of research have
  changed dramatically.
• The social sciences operated on the premise that
  a proper knowledge of social phenomena allowed
  for more efficient policy interventions.
• The ecology of the social sciences has been
  transformed with some disciplines, like
  economics, becoming central, while others, like
  sociology, retreating from their previous
  engagement with administrative arenas or policy
  debate.
• Emerging Trends in Socio-economic Sciences and
  Humanities in Europe. EC, 2009

Semester 1, 2009
Five Rules for Social Science
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5 Rules A Journey

• WHERE I am now.
• WHY I have come here.
• HOW I got there.
• WHAT we do now

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Five Rules for the Public Practice of a
Professional Social Science

• Engage with public actors and issues
• Treasury and social mobility
• Conduct strategic research and publish it
• National survey of social mobility, publications
• Save your data and make it available to others
• Data on NZSSDS, used in international surveys
• Link your work to broad analytical frameworks
• Social mobility ? New Zealand public policy
• Use advanced methods that generate insights
• Basic teaching in research methods (e.g. NZSSN)

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Informing Health and Social PolicyThe Work
Programme ofthe Centre of Methods Policy
Application in the Social Sciences (COMPASS)

• 2nd Colloquium
• Statistics NZ, Wellington
• 19th August 2008

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Colloquium programme

• 10.00 MORNING TEA
• 10.30 INTRODUCTION Peter Davis
• 11.00 Social Policy Monitoring and Evaluation
• Family Indicators Mervyl McPherson
• Census Data Guide Chris Errington
• 12.45 LUNCH BREAK
• 13.00 Lunch and Official Launch of Reports
• 14.00 Primary Care in an Ageing Society
• Developing a Model Prototype Janet Pearson
• Constructing a Data Platform Martin von Randow
• Estimating Key Parameters Sanat Pradhan
• 15.00 PANEL AND DISCUSSION
• 15.30 Research Infrastructure and Services
• Capacity Building Martin von Randow
• Data Service Martin von Randow
• 16.00 FUTURE DISCUSSION
• AFTERNOON TEA

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Treasury Guest Lectures

• 20 August 2008 Early Childhood centres as places
  for Family Resilience and Social Capital.
  Associate Professor Judith Duncan.
• 17 July 2007 Left Out and Missing Out
  Deprivation and Social Exclusion in Australia.
  Professor Peter Saunders.
• 4 July 2007 Do Poor Children Becomes Poor
  Adults? Lessons from a Cross Country Comparison
  of Generational Earnings Mobility. Professor
  Miles Corak.
• 22 May 2001. From the DPB to Work. Professor
  Maureen Baker.

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Social Mobility in New Zealand

• Presented by Matthew Gibbons
• matthew.gibbons_at_treasury.govt.nz

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Social mobility

• Background
• Objective
• Method and data
• Results
• Conclusion and further work

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Treasurys objective

• Identifying obstacles that prevent people from
  reaching their full potential
• With the aim of improving personal and national
  incomes and well-being

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Social mobility in New Zealand

• We used internationally comparable methods and
  data
• Regressed log of parents income / SES on log of
  childrens income/SES (Corak 2004)
• Income from Dunedin cohort study of about 1000
  children born in 197273 includes 24 living
  overseas
• Socio-economic status from 1996 NZ election
  study. Nationally representative with Maori
  oversample
• Focus on policy-relevant barriers to social
  mobility

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New Zealand in comparison

• Population social mobility in NZ is similar to
  Australia
• But the picture is more complex, with
• Social mobility lower for Maori than for the rest
  of the population once we control for education

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Looking forward

• We will investigate social mobility using 2008
  election study data
• Better understand Maori social mobility
• More finely grained education questions will
  allow additional tests on the effects of
  education

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Five Rules for the Public Practice of a
Professional Social Science

• Engage with public actors and issues
• Treasury and social mobility
• Conduct strategic research and publish it
• National survey of social mobility, publications
• Save your data and make it available to others
• Data on NZSSDS, used in international surveys
• Link your work to broad analytical frameworks
• Social mobility ? New Zealand public policy
• Use advanced methods that generate insights
• Basic teaching in research methods (e.g. NZSSN)

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Early Publications

• DAVIS, P. Social mobility in New Zealand
  Preliminary results from a national survey.
  Australian and New Zealand Journal of Sociology
  15, 50-56, 1979.
• JONES, F., DAVIS, P. Models of Society Class,
  Stratification and Gender in Australia and New
  Zealand, Sydney, Croom Helm, 174 pages, 1986.
• JONES, F., DAVIS, P. Class structuration and
  patterns of social closure in Australia and New
  Zealand. Sociology 22, 271-91, 1988.
• JONES, F., DAVIS, P. Closure and fluidity in the
  class structure. Australian and New Zealand
  Journal of Sociology 24, 226-47, 1988.

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Five Rules for the Public Practice of a
Professional Social Science

• Engage with public actors and issues
• Treasury and social mobility
• Conduct strategic research and publish it
• National survey of social mobility, publications
• Save your data and make it available to others
• Data on NZSSDS, used in international surveys
• Link your work to broad analytical frameworks
• Social mobility ? New Zealand public policy
• Use advanced methods that generate insights
• Basic teaching in research methods (e.g. NZSSN)

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New ZealandSocial Science Data ServiceContact
Martin von Randow, admin_at_nzssds.org.nz For
further information about NZSSDS, please
visithttp//www.nzssds.org.nz
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Social Science Data ServiceMiddleware NESSTAR
Administrators (Archivist/Data Librarian)
User community (Researchers, teachers, students)
IT administrators and infrastructure
(technicians and architects)
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Key Facts

• We have 20 data sets archived, under two main
  subject areas Health and Politics
• We have presented seminars and live
  demonstrations
• University of Auckland departments, Research
  Committee
• KAREN (Kiwi Advanced Research Education
  Network) Forum
• Statistics New Zealand
• University of Canterbury
• TASA/SAANZ Conference
• 30 registered users 9 with specific data
  requests
• Good use of election study data sets within the
  University
• Use of oral health survey data by a researcher in
  Holland
• Use of election study sets by several US
  University students

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Five Rules for the Public Practice of a
Professional Social Science

• Engage with public actors and issues
• Treasury and social mobility
• Conduct strategic research and publish it
• National survey of social mobility, publications
• Save your data and make it available to others
• Data on NZSSDS, used in international surveys
• Link your work to broad analytical frameworks
• Social mobility ? New Zealand public policy
• Use advanced methods that generate insights
• Basic teaching in research methods (e.g. NZSSN)

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Social Mobility. Political Arithmetic of the
Good Society?

• Peter Davis
• Centre of Methods and Policy Application in the
  Social Sciences
• University of Auckland
• 18 August 2008

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Outline

• The interface between research and policy
• Colloquium Informing Health and Social Policy
• What is Sociology?
• The study of patterns of social interaction
• How do sociologists look at social mobility?
• Structure, flux, and opportunity
• What are the international trends?
• Economic development, social fluidity, and
  regime
• What of the future in New Zealand?
• Globalisation, public policy and social democracy

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SELECTED MASTER SOCIAL TRENDS. CONTRASTING
POLICY FUTURES
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Five Rules for the Public Practice of a
Professional Social Science

• Engage with public actors and issues
• Treasury and social mobility
• Conduct strategic research and publish it
• National survey of social mobility, publications
• Save your data and make it available to others
• Data on NZSSDS, used in international surveys
• Link your work to broad analytical frameworks
• Social mobility ? New Zealand public policy
• Use advanced methods that generate insights
• Basic teaching in research methods (e.g. NZSSN)

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New ZealandSocial Statistics Network- update on
activities -

• Martin von RandowCentre of Methods and Policy
  Applications in the Social SciencesThe
  University of Auckland

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NZSSN

• was established in November 2004
• is a group of like-minded researchers committed
  to the development of social science research
• follows the model of the Australian Consortium
  for Social and Political Research Incorporated
  (ACSPRI)
• aims to assist in the development of quantitative
  social science research in the academic,
  government and private research sectors
• provides a focus for sharing research development
  resources and improving accessibility of
  quantitative research data

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Summer programmes

• Started in February 2005 offering short courses
• At least five 5-day courses each year since 2006
• Usually hosted by VUWs School of Government
• Courses including Introduction to Statistics
  Intermediate Statistics Introduction to SPSS
  Introduction to NVivo Using Mixed Methods in
  Research and Program Evaluation
• And advanced methods workshops, visiting speakers
• Presented in Auckland and Wellington

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Five Rules for the Public Practice of a
Professional Social Science

• Engage with public actors and issues
• Treasury and social mobility
• Conduct strategic research and publish it
• National survey of social mobility, publications
• Save your data and make it available to others
• Data on NZSSDS, used in international surveys
• Link your work to broad analytical frameworks
• Social mobility ? New Zealand public policy
• Use advanced methods that generate insights
• Basic teaching in research methods (e.g. NZSSN)

Semester 1, 2009
Five Rules for Social Science
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Basic Two Way Table (2001)
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The results presented in this study are the work
of the author, not Statistics New Zealand.
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Diagonal dominance factors
How many times greater are the frequencies on the
diagonal than we would expect assuming basic
independence.
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The results presented in this study are the work
of the author, not Statistics New Zealand.
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5 Rules A Journey

• WHERE I am now.
• WHY I have come here.
• HOW I got there.
• WHAT we do now

39
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Five Rules for the Public Practice of a
Professional Social Science

• Engage with public actors and issues
• Agenda - evidence-based public social science
• Conduct strategic research and publish it
• Mix of investigator-initiated and RFP projects
• Save your data and make it available to others
• More data sets to NZSSDS? Access SNZ data?
• Link your work to broad analytical frameworks
• Applied empiricism can defeat analytical insight
  
• Use advanced methods that generate insights
• Teaching networks to pool scarce expertise?

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