Past Data Seminars

Past Data Library Instructional Events

Data from the American Community Survey

Held Friday, March 28, 2008 at 10:00 in Kiva Auditorium.
This event was designed to help researchers understand the American Community Survey, which is replacing the Census' long form. The American Community Survey lets communities see how they are changing - filling in the gaps between each 10-year census.

The ACS:

is sent to a small percentage of our population on a rotating basis;
helps determine how more than $300 billion per year is distributed;
informs decisions on policies, programs, and services for communities;
is also conducted in Puerto Rico, where it is called the Puerto Rico Community Survey.

Data Seminar, Financial Data from Wharton Research Data Services

Held March 12th, 2007

WRDS data: Wharton Research Data Services, or WRDS, is a comprehensive web-based data management system that allows faculty and students to easily retrieve information from a wide variety of financial, economic, and marketing data sources. Developed in 1993 to support faculty research at The Wharton School, the service has since evolved to include over 150 academic institutions.

WRDS is best known for its holdings of historical financial data from CRSP and COMPUSTAT. This data covers over 30,000 companies and includes security prices and trading volume, income and balance sheet items. We provide access to IBES' analyst projections for earnings and sales. WRDS also contains stock market indices, bond prices and interest rates, mutual fund and stock ownership information, options data, and a wide array of macroeconomic time series. International data, marketing and industry reports, and web usage data are also available on WRDS.

For assistance with WRDS, please contact the data library.

Research Methods Workshop: Data Collection Methods

The Social Science Data Library (SSDL) presented three data collection seminar series during fall 2006: How to Collect Your Own Data: (1) Surveys, (2) Interviews, and (3) Focus Groups. Each seminar focussed on a different data collection technique.

Held September 29, 2006

Surveys covered issues of survey development and implementation, including topics like sample selection, data collection methods (paper surveys, web surveys, phone surveys, etc), survey instrument development, pre-testing, data collection, hiring and training interviewers, integration of data collection with planned analysis, and analytical techniques and reporting results. The seminar took place on September 29th and was presented by Peter Mulcahy from Temple University’s Institute of Survey Research. Click here for a powerpoint presentation from the seminar.

Held October 27, 2006

Interviews discussed approaches to interviews, stages of interview research; analysis of data collected by interviews; nuts and bolts of interview data collection, collective interviews comparison; dimensions of group interviews; myths about group interviews and group dynamics during interviews. The seminar took place on October 27th and was presented by Dr. Pablo Villa, a professor in the Temple University’s Sociology Department. Click here for notes from the seminar.

Held November 17, 2006

Focus Groups focussed on issues in managing focus groups such as: thier strengths and weaknesses, common uses, personnel recruitment and training, styles of moderation, interview guide formats and analysis of the data collected. The seminar took place on November 17th and was presented by Peter Mulcahy from Temple University’s Institute of Survey Research. Click here for a powerpoint presentation from the seminar.

Data Seminar: The CML's Neighborhood Information System

Held February 17th and March 3rd, 2006

As a followup to Dr. Culhane's introduction to the University of Pennsylvania's Cartographic Modeling Lab, Krista Heinlen, the CML's NIS Outreach Coordinator provided a hands-on introduction describing the features and use of the CML's Neighborhood Information System.
The NIS is a family of interactive applications that allow you to find information about Philadelphia neighborhoods. NeighborhoodBase, for example, contains information about home ownership, sales history, assessment history, violations, utilities shutoffs or assistance, taxes, and more. The training session provided an overview of the four main NIS applications: parcelBase, neigbhborhoodBase, crimeBase, and muralBase. Anyone who missed the training who is interested in finding out more about the NIS should contact the SSDL for more an individual consultation.

Data Seminar: Accessing National and State Patient-Level Data

Held February 6, 2006

The Social Science Data Library and the College of Health Profession’s Public Health Department sponsored the Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project and the Pennsylvania Health Care Cost Containment Council.

The Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project (HCUP, pronounced "H-Cup") is a family of powerful health care databases, software tools, and products for advancing research. Sponsored by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), HCUP includes the largest all-payer, encounter-level collection of longitudinal patient-level health care data (inpatient, ambulatory surgery, and emergency department) in the United States, beginning in 1988. AHRQ staff will be presenting information about the data available at HCUP and tools to access that data.

Data Seminar: PHC4 Health Care Data for Research and Study

Held February 6, 2006

The Pennsylvania Health Care Cost Containment Council (PHC4) is an independent state agency established by legislation in 1986. PHC4's mission is to improve the quality of health care while restraining costs, and promoting competition in the marketplace. PHC4 collects over 4 million inpatient hospital discharge and ambulatory procedure records each year. PHC4 also collects facility financial, utilization and payor data, as well as heart surgery data. This agency was one of the first health care data organizations to risk-adjust inpatient outcome data. The presentation will introduce PHC4, describe the data bases available over the internet and through special arrangement, public reports and special request unit.

This seminar focused on primarily on hospital inpatient data. PHC4 described the history of their organization and the rules for accessing the data. HCUP went second and described four sets of data they collect from the states, standardize, and make available to researchers. The SSDL may still have materials from HCUP, for those interested. In addition, SSDL staff can provide a summary of the information from this seminar, either in individual appointments, or in group settings.

Data Seminar: The University of Pennsylvania's Cartographic Modeling Lab

Held November 30th, 2005

Dennis Culhane, the faculty director of the Cartographic Modeling Lab at the University of Pennsylvania, described the lab's current efforts in archiving local administrative data for use by researchers. The two primary projects, the Neighborhood Information System (NIS) and the Kids Integrated Database System (KIDS), involve the storage of data from various city and state agencies from 1996 to the present. Culhane described the data sources available, and the procedures that students and faculty can use to access the data for their research.

Data Seminar: Qualitative Data Analysis Software

Held September 30, 2005.

Qualitative Data Software Conference Attracts Over One Hundred Temple Researchers: the Social Science Data Library, together with the Institute for Public Affairs, and the Office of the Vice President for Research and Graduate Studies, held a one-day qualitative data research conference. Raymond Maietta, President of Research Talk, introduced and compared the strengths of qualitative data analysis software packages including MAXqda, HyperResearch, Atlas.ti , NVivo, and Qualrus in the morning session. The afternoon session provided an introduction and training on Atlas.ti and MAXqda. Conference attendee feedback demonstrated a lot of excitement about the possibilities of the software and practically demanded more information and support from the university.

Information about SSDL support for researchers using qualitative data.