The Statistical and Applied Mathematical Sciences Institute (SAMSI) sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF) is hosting a semester-long program on Data Science in the Social and Behavioral Sciences from January to May 2021. The program will be hosted at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill along with SAMSI’s other partners at Duke University and North Carolina State University.
The main component of the SAMSI Programs are several working groups that run throughout the semester. These working groups are bookended by an opening workshop (several days in January) and closing workshop (several days in April/May). The opening workshop will help set the directions of the semester-long working groups.
The major themes of the SAMSI Data Science in the Social and Behavioral Sciences program will include:
- Social network analysis and network neuroscience, including challenges around network sampling, temporal and multilayer networks, and network modeling of disease and behavior.
- Comparisons and synthesis in causal inference and statistical modeling across structural equation models, directed acyclic graphs, and counterfactual approaches.
- Consideration of new forms of digital data and the methods to analyze such data. Possible examples include wearables, GPS tracking, web scraping, sensor data, computer-aided text analysis, sentiment analysis, intensive time-series, etc.
Program Working Groups
Working Group I: Big Data Quality
Leaders – Sunshine Hillygus (Duke Political Science and Public Policy), Alex Volfovsky ( Duke Statistics), SAMSI RA: Karen Medlin (UNC Math)
Working Group II: Misinformation, Information Campaigns, and Event Data
Leaders – Yijyun Lin (University of Nevada, Reno), Ali Hürriyetoğlu, Koç University, Ahmed M. Elmisery, Malm University
Working Group III: Diffusion of Information in Online Social Networks
Leader – Diego Fregolente, SAMSI
Working Group IV: Simulated-data Experimentation to Understand
Leader – Keith O’Rourke, O’Rourke Consulting
Working Group V: Integrating and Expanding Networks of Networks Theories
Leader – Kate Albrecht, University of Illinois-Chicago
Working Group VI: Spacial Mediation and Longitudinal Modeling
Leader – Emil Coman, University of Connecticut
Working Group VII: Estimation of Agent-Based Models
Leader – Bruce Rogers
Working Group VIII: Cross-Translating Contemporary Causal Modeling Methods
Leaders – Ken Bollen, UNC & Emil Coman, University of Connecticut
Working Group IX: Weights in Data Analysis
Leader – Stas Kolenikov, Abt Associates
Working Group X: Causal Inference with Network Structures
Leader – Weihua An, Emory University
Working Group XI: Brain Networks
Leaders – Maria Bagonis, Alana Campbell, UNC
Working Group XII: Networks and Victimization
Leader – Bernard Coles IV, SAMSI/Duke
Working Group XIII: Networks and Psychology (REGISTER)
Leader – Ruchira Datta, Datta Enterprises LLC
To see more information on research and other opportunities, visit the links below:
Participation in Workshops
Participation in Working Groups