Ryan Bakker

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University of St.Gallen

University of Essex

Course location

University of St.Gallen

Home university

University of Essex

I received my PhD in political science from the University of North Carolina in 2007. My research focusses on party-voter connections and measurement of political party ideological positions. I am a principal investigator on the Chapel Hill Expert Survey team and a member of the Human Rights Measurement Initiative data team. From 2008-2019, I was a professor of political science at the Unviersity of Georgia. Since 2019, I have been a Reader of Comparative Politics at the University of Essex. Other than party politics, my research interests include Bayesian analysis and measurement theory.

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Bayesian Data Analysis

Learning objectives:
To understand what the Bayesian approach to statistical modeling is and to appreciate the differences between the Bayesian and Frequentist approaches. The students will be able to estimate a wide variety of models in the Bayesian framework and to adjust example code to fit their specific modeling needs.

Course content:
-Theory/foundations of the Bayesian approach including:
-objective vs subjective probability
-how to derive and incorporate prior information
-the basics of MCMC sampling
-assessing convergence of Markov Chains
-Bayesian difference of means/ANOVA
-Bayesian versions of: Linear models, logit/probit (dichotomous/ordered/unordered choice models), Count models, Latent variable and measurement models, Multilevel models
-presentation of results

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