Blind and Visually Impaired Community
↑
9
↓
Accessible Social science statistical research programs? (self.Blind)
submitted by ENTJ351
Welp, there seems to be no good way around this, as long as I stay in the social science field. I obviously do not belong in the art ones. I dislike math, and have a lot of difficulty with it. I chose the easy way and completed college algebra and got out of it. I see this is my mistake. I recently started to skim over my book for public policy, and realized most of it had to do with statistics. My point? Well, my question is a bit different. I have once a while ago been in social sciences in the form of psychology. Now I know that we used a certain program for statistical analysis in terms of measuring psychological. Numbers. I am guessing we’ll have to do very similar things with political science data. At that point it was back in 2012 or 2013 we had tried to find solutions to my problems, but we could not find any good way. My class at the time went in to a computer lab to work on a program I believe it’s called SPSS but don’t quote me on it. It was not accessible for me. Now it’s 2018. I am now back in a social science after wondering off in to a fundamental science, an art, and a technical field. I am reposing this question. Is there a program for social scientists to calculate statistical things that is equivalent to something like SPSS or whatever professional software Political scientists would use?? I would love to know the answer. I have a windows box, but would prefer not to use it. I mainly use a mac and the iphone and an ipad.
Thanks a lot!
Thanks a lot!
notthatkindadoctor 3 points 4y ago
R. It’s called R, just the letter. It’s free, it’s more powerful than SPSS and it doesn’t require a graphical user interface. It also has tons of extensions because it’s so popular among social and other scientists and is open access.
Then look up the package called BrailleR. It’s specifically to make R work even better for blind users. Developed by a blind stats prof named Godfrey. He has papers published about it, and lots of documentation, also free.
R is slowly becoming the default in scientific labs in social science, but the process is slow because the profs teaching stats classes in those departments learned SPSS and change is hard. But new profs come in fresh out of graduate school where they are as likely to use R as SPSS these days.
SPSS does have JAWS integration but I’ve heard it’s not ideal, and also JAWS isn’t free.
Then look up the package called BrailleR. It’s specifically to make R work even better for blind users. Developed by a blind stats prof named Godfrey. He has papers published about it, and lots of documentation, also free.
R is slowly becoming the default in scientific labs in social science, but the process is slow because the profs teaching stats classes in those departments learned SPSS and change is hard. But new profs come in fresh out of graduate school where they are as likely to use R as SPSS these days.
SPSS does have JAWS integration but I’ve heard it’s not ideal, and also JAWS isn’t free.
ENTJ351 [OP] 1 points 4y ago
Ah, that’s neat. Thanks! I’ll look in to r. That’s neat there’s a brailler extension.
Really? Is that a new thing? SPss Jaws extension? back in 2012 or 2013 we didn’t find it, or maybe it was just ignorance. That’s neat though.
Really? Is that a new thing? SPss Jaws extension? back in 2012 or 2013 we didn’t find it, or maybe it was just ignorance. That’s neat though.
notthatkindadoctor 1 points 4y ago
JAWS is advertised as compatible for a SPSS, but I had a blind student in my stats course who said it didn’t play well with the screen reader. Maybe with more practice, but honestly R and BrailleR work way smoother and with more power for charts and graphs, be it text converted, audio converted, or tactile printed (with a capital R at the end of braille, not to be confused with the assistive tech called a brailler). Those working in statistics in the blind community seem to much prefer R.
ENTJ351 [OP] 1 points 4y ago
Thanks for the data. Yeah, I had that impression but I was never the one to play with it, I was just told it wasn’t accessible. But interesting indeed.
I’ll take a look. Thanks a lot. At least I have something to play with.
I’ll take a look. Thanks a lot. At least I have something to play with.
penguin_rider222 1 points 4y ago
I’m in a similar boat. I have RP, so my vision is rapidly declining, but I work in policy data analysis. I’m not sure how blind you are, but basically we need to learn a programming software. I havent had to deal with screen readers yet, but Im told blind programmers can code just as quickly as a sighted person. I’m scared, but optimistic.
Stata is the most common for policy work. R is quickly gaining traction, and python is popular for financial data. SPSS used to be common in social science research (especially psych), but has lost favor over the past 5 years. Basically all the social scientists are now trained in programming languages. If you study Stata, you will be very qualified for the job market of the next 5 years, but I predict R/python will soon dominate. I recommend you learn R and Stata. Dont waste your time with SPSS imo; even if you get JAWS to work on it, you will be very slow compared to a command line program.
Stata is the most common for policy work. R is quickly gaining traction, and python is popular for financial data. SPSS used to be common in social science research (especially psych), but has lost favor over the past 5 years. Basically all the social scientists are now trained in programming languages. If you study Stata, you will be very qualified for the job market of the next 5 years, but I predict R/python will soon dominate. I recommend you learn R and Stata. Dont waste your time with SPSS imo; even if you get JAWS to work on it, you will be very slow compared to a command line program.
ENTJ351 [OP] 1 points 4y ago
Well. Interesting. Thanks for the insight. I am totally blind. I took a very basics stats course and barely scraped a C. I usually do very well in school. I took a more basic math and learnt more on mathematics theory so may have a better grasp but first have to get myself reacquainted. That’s pretty interesting about SPSS and I know it was very popular with psychology back then, because I was a psych student then. But that’s interesting about stata. I’ll have to look in to that, and r is definitely a possibility someone just said that r is very very accessible. So yeah, you may want to go look at his comment.
penguin_rider222 1 points 4y ago
SPSS used to be the main social science stat program, but as datasets got larger, most researchers needed more powerful programs. SPSS has lasted longer in psych since most experiments use small sample sizes and simple statistical tests. However, computational psych methods are gaining popularity, so the field is moving away from SPSS too.
SPSS is intuitive and simple, but its not very powerful.
SPSS is intuitive and simple, but its not very powerful.
codeofdusk 1 points 4y ago
ENTJ351 [OP] 1 points 4y ago
Er. I’ve definitely haven’t had any experience with coding python, but that’s interesting. Thanks.
This nonprofit website is run by volunteers.
Please contribute if you can. Thank you!
Our mission is to provide everyone with access to large-
scale community websites for the good of humanity.
Without ads, without tracking, without greed.
scale community websites for the good of humanity.
Without ads, without tracking, without greed.
©2023 HumbleCat Inc • HumbleCat is a 501(c)3 nonprofit based in Michigan, USA.