Course SOC 209 · Year I · Summer 2026-2027

Social statistics

Compulsory course in Sociology, taught by Bogdan Nicolae Mucea.

Overview

Lecturer
Bogdan Nicolae Mucea
Seminar tutor
Bogdan Nicolae Mucea
Type of course
Compulsory
Language of instruction
Romanian
Erasmus language
English
Domain
Sociology
Field of study
Sociology
Form of education
Full-time
Form of instruction
Class
Credit awarded by
Grade
Teaching methods
Lecture, Conversation, Example

Aims

Acquiring the basic knowledge and skills necessary to apply descriptive and inferential statistics in the analysis of social phenomena.

Understanding the fundamental concepts of probability, distributions, estimation, and hypothesis testing

- Use of computer programs for statistical calculations and graphical representations.

- Critical interpretation of statistical results in sociological contexts

Course contents

1. Introduction to statistics
- The role of statistics in scientific research
- The use of statistics in the sociologist profession
2. Preparing data for analysis
- Measuring the characteristics of variables
3. Presentation of a statistical analysis program (SPSS, PSPP)
- Building a database
4. Descriptive statistics - univariate
- Frequency distributions
- Graphical presentation of frequency distributions
- Relative frequencies, cumulative frequencies
5. Indicators of central tendency
- Mean
- Mode
- Median
- Mean deviation, standard deviation and variance
6. Indicators of dispersion
- Amplitude
- Standard deviation
7. Descriptive statistics - bivariate
- Testing statistical links depending on the type of variables
- Discrete variables and continuous variables
8 Contingency tables
- Definition and calculation of the HI squared size, statistical significance and association coefficients based on this value

9. linear covariance of two variables
- Correlation coefficient (Bravis-Pearson)
- One-Way ANOVA
- Calculating the correlation coefficient with the SPSS, PSPP program
- Interpreting data from correlation tables in SPSS, PSPP
10. Independent simple t test (t test) and Mann Whitney U test (for ordinal variables)
11 Regression analysis - Linear regression in the case of two variables
- General aspects, regression equation
- Interpreting the point cloud that graphically expresses the relationship between two quantitative variables
12 Association of nominal qualitative characteristics
- Symmetric indicators of the association of nominal qualitative characteristics
- Asymmetric indicators of the association of nominal qualitative characteristics
13 Association of ordinal qualitative characteristics
- Coefficient τa (Kendall's) and Coefficients τb and τc (Kendall's)

Learning outcomes

A1 – Uses specialized computer applications and programs to manage databases with socioeconomic and cultural indicators.
R3 – Analyzes empirical data and critically evaluates sociocultural research efforts.
R6 – Constructs and evaluates relevant social indicators for social and cultural research.

Assessment

– Define and choose statistical methods for social research. Identify appropriate methods, techniques, procedures and tools for the statistical analysis of social phenomena

Recommended reading

Elemente de analiză comparativă
Dusa A.
Tritonic, Bucuresti, 2014 · 160
Metode statistice aplicate în științele sociale
Rotariu, T., Iluț, P., coord
Polirom, Iasi, 1999 · 420
Social Statistics
-
SAGE Publications, -, 2010 · -