Bayesian Analysis for the Social Sciences

Bayesian methods are increasingly being used in the social sciences, as the problems encountered lend themselves so naturally to the subjective qualities of Bayesian methodology. This book provides an accessible introduction to Bayesian methods, tailored specifically for social science students. It contains lots of real examples from political science, psychology, sociology, and economics, exercises in all chapters, and detailed descriptions of all the key concepts, without assuming any background in statistics beyond a first course. It features examples of how to implement the methods using WinBUGS – the most-widely used Bayesian analysis software in the world – and R – an open-source statistical software. The book is supported by a Website featuring WinBUGS and R code, and data sets.

“This is a comprehensive text on applied Bayesian statistics. Though it is primarily aimed at social scientists with strong computational and statistical backgrounds, its scope should appeal to a wider readership.  I recommend it to anybody interested in actually applying Bayesian methods.”   (Significance, 1 June 2010) "As in many texts, each chapter ends with a collection of exercises which would make this text suitable for teaching a one-semester course in Bayesian methods with applications in the social sciences . . . with this small caveat, I was impressed with the text and believe it would be a worthy candidate for a first Bayesian courses that gives the student a balanced view of the theory and practice of Bayesian thinking." (The American Statistician, 1 February 2011)

Simon Jackman is a political scientist by trade but has a tremendous amount of experience in using Bayesian methods for solving problems in the social and political sciences, and teaching Bayesian methods to social science students.