The Institute for Social Research and Data Innovation hosted its first ever Student Poster Extravaganza of May 1.
This poster session featured research from two MPC faculty-led courses that trained graduate and undergraduate students in quantitative analysis, MPC’s College of Liberal Arts Freshman Interns, and MPC Graduate Trainees in Population Studies (who come from PhD programs in several colleges and departments).
Students from a course taught by Kathryn Grace and Liz Boyle created posters related to global health and family planning using IPUMS PMA and IPUMS DHS data. For example, geography major Suzy Scotty researched the relationship between a woman’s knowledge of contraceptive methods in Niger and her desire to delay her next pregnancy or have no more children. When age was controlled, greater knowledge of contraceptives had a positive relationship with desire to plan one’s family size and spacing.
Students from Rob Warren’s course started with every 0 to 10-year-old boy in the complete-count 1920 US Census (where you can see the boys’ demographics, geography, and family SES). They then linked all of those boys to the 1940 US Census (where you can see the boys’ educational attainment, income, and occupation as young adults) and to the mortality records from the Social Security Administration. This enabled them to see how early life conditions affected long-term outcomes for the boys.
The Poster Extravaganza will be continued in future years, providing an opportunity to see the exciting student research being done by undergraduate and graduate students at MPC and to learn more about our graduate training programs.
Story by Elizabeth Boyle
Professor of Sociology
PI — IPUMS PMA and IPUMS DHS