R for the Social Science Academic

Goal of this page: 

As a graduate student, I discovered the versatility of R beyond its typical use in statistical analysis. I found it invaluable for tasks such as preparing lectures and writing articles. As an instructor, I have encouraged my students to participate in online Learn R workshops and to integrate R into their assignments. Students are often curious about the research process and the tools involved. Since I am not a fan of the extensive use of Google Docs, I frequently receive questions about how I use RMarkdown to design my class presentations, and utilize R in class for randomly generating groups and real-time data visualization. 

Recently, at the end of my Political Economy of Latin America class, my students began sharing Beamer-like templates for PowerPoint for their final presentations. Although they weren’t using RMarkdown to create them, I found it amusing and believe it is a step in the right direction. R provides them with practical skills and serves as a gateway to exploring more advanced programming languages.

While R is widely recognized for its econometrics and data visualization applications, there are much better resources in those areas than I can provide. This page will focus on its use in writing articles and preparing presentations, using packages on game theory and qualitative data analysis, and its integration into social science pedagogy.