Transparent and Open Social Science Research

Explore tools to address transparency issues in social science research

Demand for evidence-based policy is growing, but so is recognition that limited transparency in social science research has contributed to what many have called a crisis of reproducibility and credibility.

Join this course to discuss major transparency issues, including fraud, publication bias, and data mining. You’ll also discuss emerging solutions to these problems, explore tools to improve transparency in your own research, and identify flaws in others’ work.

This course was developed by the Berkeley Initiative for Transparency in the Social Sciences (BITSS), headquartered at UC Berkeley.

This course is designed for academics and practitioners who are engaging in social science research, as well as anyone who is interested in better understanding open science and research transparency.

To get the most out of this course, you will need:

• a good understanding of statistics
• undergraduate or preferably graduate experience of econometrics and/or statistical methods
• some experience with statistical software such as Stata or R.

To take part in this course, we recommend you install R, a free statistical software. Download R at https://www.r-project.org/.

You can also use Stata, which can be downloaded for a fee. Many educational institutions offer discounted packages to registered students. Learn more at https://www.stata.com/.