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Bayesian Statistics and Political Recruitment: A Comment

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2009

Extract

In an important contribution to the improvement of data analytical techniques in political science, Budge and Farlie examine the predictive success of various background characteristics in determining political activism [Ian Budge and Dennis Farlie, ‘Political Recruitment and Dropout’, this Journal, v (1975), 33–68]. The authors use the framework of Bayesian statistics, in which the subjective probability that a given individual will be a political activist is revised in the light of sample information about the background characteristics of activists to give a posterior (i.e. after the information or event) probability that the individual is an activist. Unfortunately, as the authors admit, they do not utilize fully all the components of the Bayesian approach.

Type
Notes and Comments
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1976

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References

1 Savage, L. J., The Foundations of Statistics (New York: Dover, 1972), p. 66.Google Scholar

2 For a non-technical explanation of this measure see Shannon, Claude E. and Weaver, Warren, The Mathematical Theory of Communication (Urbana, Ill.: University of Illinois Press, 1972), pp. 1415.Google Scholar