Data is everywhere
The Seminars in Applied Economics brings data and statistics to life.
The first half of the course introduces all the basics from scratch. You go from zero you hero in data analysis and data science and will become data fluent and learn major skills that you can use in your academic and business career.
You learn about types of data (numbers, text or images). Is the data structured like a spreadsheet or unstructured like a text message. You learn about primary data gathered by the researcher himself and about secondary data collected by someone else. We will use various datasets from the real world.
We explore different technologies and software to handle data. We apply on R, Github and Datacamp (and others). R is a free and open statistical software for data analysis. Github is a system for version control and file sharing. Datacamp is a learning platform to enhance learning languages like R and fundamental concepts of data and data analysis.
The second half of the course focuses on research projects. We try to answer apparently simple but intriguing questions from daily life. For example:
- Can beauty affect employment chances and income level?
- How does unemployment affect happiness?
- Does owning a pet makes you live longer?
- Can working from home increase employee's work effort?
- Why can't money buy happiness?
- What is the impact of a vegetarian diet?
- Are lefthander different from righthander?
Students are given the opportunity to work on a personal project under intense supervision. We use state of the art questionaire data (SOEP) and learn and practice critical, statistical thinking based on complex rectangular panel data. The topics stem from the field of happiness research and labour market discrimination.
The seminar is a good preparation for an (empirical) thesis.