Demographics and Non-Traditional Civic Participation: A Data-Driven Learning Guide

Application

In this exercise, you will examine the relationship between non-traditional civic participation and demographic characteristics. Crosstabulation will be used.

In this dataset, respondent's age can be measured by subtracting the respondent's year of birth from 1990 (the year the survey was administered). Next, we recoded the age variable into six age groups to make the crosstab analysis more readable. Missing data were excluded as was the individual born in 1978 since all respondents were supposed to be at least 18 years of age in order to be included in the survey. We called the new variable "AGE.CATS." Look at the frequency table for AGE.CATS . Which age group has the most respondents?

Family income was also measured with a large number of categories. We recoded this variable into five income groups (under $25,000; 25,000-49,999; 50,000-74,999; 75,000-99,999; and 100,000+) and named the new variable "FAMINC.CATS." Missing data were excluded from the recode. Look at the frequency table for the new income variable. Which income group has the most respondents? Which income group has the least number of respondents?

Age and Campaign Volunteerism

Now, consider the relationship between age and campaign volunteerism (CW88). Respondents who volunteered for the 1988 presidential campaign were coded as "2." Respondents who did not volunteer for campaign were coded as "1." Examine the crosstab of volunteerism by age. Which age groups are most likely to volunteer?

Gender and Campaign Volunteerism

Now consider the crosstab of campaign volunteerism by gender. What percentage of men in this dataset volunteered to help a campaign effort in 1988? What percentage of women volunteered?

Income and Campaign Volunteerism

Next consider if volunteering for a campaign is related to family income. Are people with higher family incomes more likely to volunteer for a campaign? What percentage of those respondents making less than $25,000 volunteered for the campaign?

Monetary Contributions

It is also interesting to know if contributing money to a campaign varies by age, gender, or income. First, consider the crosstab of 1988 campaign contribution by age group. Which age groups were more likely to give money to a campaign? What does the pattern here tell you about the relationship between these two variables?

Are men or women more likely to contribute money to a campaign? Does this pattern look similar to the pattern in the crosstab between gender and volunteerism?

One would expect those with higher income to be more likely to make monetary contributions to campaigns. Looking at the crosstab of monetary contributions by income, do you observe a pattern that is consistent with this hypothesis? How does this relationship compare to the one between income and propensity to volunteer? Taking the past three crosstabs into consideration, what can you say about demographics and one's propensity to contribute money to a campaign?

Protesting

Consider the relationship between PT2YRS and AGE.CATS. Which age group is most likely to take part in a protest? How does this differ from the other age crosstabs? If there is a difference among these three crosstabs, why might this difference exist?

Are men or women more likely to take part in a protest? Does the relationship between protest participation and gender seem to be different than the relationship between gender and either volunteering for or contributing to campaigns? If so, what is one reason for the difference?

Finally, look at the crosstab showing the relationship between protest participation and family income. Which income group is most likely to have taken part in a protest? Which income group is least likely? Is the pattern here similar to the patterns shown in the other income crosstabs?

Note: The online data analysis system (DAS) used on this site uses a system called Survey Documentation and Analysis (SDA), developed and maintained by the Computer-assisted Survey Methods Program (CSM) at the University of California, Berkeley. Documentation for DAS/SDA can be found on their Web site.

Goal & Concept - Dataset - Application - Interpretation & Summary - Bibliography