1 Introduction

With this page, we want to help students, researchers, and practitioners that are used to STATA to include R in their analytic toolbox. Likewise, we present some of the most used panel analysis’ technics showing the potential of different approaches.

This page is not a statistic textbook; we won’t discuss the statistic assumptions or mathematical derivations behind the techniques. We are assuming two things. First, the reader has enough statistical background to understand the strengths and limitations of each model. Second, the user knows more STATA than R. Therefore, our STATA code will have fewer comments than the R code. Navigate among the topics covered here using the top menu.

We value both statistical packages and think that nowadays a researcher/student/practitioner should be able to conduct analysis on both.

Here are some textbooks that we recommend for panel analysis:

  • Allison, Paul. 2009. Fixed Effects Regression Models. Thousand Oaks, Ca.: Sage Publications.
  • Finkel, Steven E. 1995. Causal Analysis with Panel Data. Thousand Oaks, Ca.: Sage Publications. (Royalties donated to University of Pittsburgh Chapter, Pi Sigma Alpha, Political Science Undergraduate Honor Society).
  • Andreß, Golsch, and Schmidt. 2013. Applied Panel Data Analysis for Economic and Social Surveys. Heidelberg: Springer-Verlag.

2 Authors:

2.1 Steven Finkel

Steven E. Finkel is the Daniel Wallace Professor of Political Science at the University of Pittsburgh. His areas of expertise include comparative political behavior, public opinion, democratization, and quantitative methods. Since 1997, he has conducted evaluations of the effectiveness of US and other international donors’ civic education programs in South Africa, Poland, the Dominican Republic, and Kenya. He has also pioneered the use of survey research as an aid to peace negotiations in conflict settings such as Sri Lanka and Kosovo. He is the author of Causal Analysis with Panel Data (Sage Publications, 1995) as well as numerous articles on political participation, voting behavior, and civic education in new and established democracies. Between 2004 and 2007, he conducted the first macro-comparative evaluation of the impact of all USAID democracy assistance programs on democratic development in recipient countries (published in World Politics, 2007). He holds a PhD in political science from the State University of New York at Stony Brook, and has taught previously at the University of Virginia, Arizona State University, and the Hertie School of Governance in Berlin, Germany.

Website

2.2 José Incio

José Incio is a Ph.D. Candidate in Political Science at the University of Pittsburgh. His research interest include subnational politics, democracy, and political methodology.

Website

2.3 Junghyun Lim

Junghyun Lim is a Ph.D. Candidate in Political Science at the University of Pittsburgh. Her concentrations are IPE and political methodology. Website

3 Basics

Code:

STATA and R code will be in grey boxes like this:

Notes about R, and R features will also be in boxes like this:

Sometimes the output has warnings. We are not showing those here. In general, you should not worry about warnings. However, be wary about errors. When the output shows “error” that means something is wrong and R didn’t execute the code.

3.1 R packages and data sets

We are going to use the following packages:

For data managment:

For modeling:

Here is some resources to learn the most basic steps:

  • How to install R and Rstudio video
  • How to install packages in R video

Let’s install all our packages at once.

  • Packages are grouped using “c()” and separated by “,”. It is possible to install one by one, or several at the same time.
  • You need to install a package only one time.
  • If you want to know which packages you have installed use the code below (Becareful, the output could be long.):
  • You can find a menu to install and browse your package at the right panel in R Studio (Highly recommended!!).