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A social scientist‟s perspectives on
data science
Drew Conway
NYC Data Science
Meetup
March 5, 2013http://www.flickr.com/photos/uiowa/804719510
0/
Hacking
Skills
Obtain Munge
I hold the following truths to be self-
evident...
1. Data come from many sources
2. Data come in many form(at)s
10
% 10
%
80
%
A .zip file of PDFs ≠ data
‣Data scientist must know where to
get data and how to obtain it
‣Work with big text files
$ head publicvotes-20101018_votes.dump
‣Work with APIs
$ curl
http://search.twitter.com/search.json?q=@dr
ewconway > drewconway.json
Real data are messy
‣Even curated data: duplicates,
missing values, date formats
‣Combine data from multiple
sources/formats
‣Tools
• *NIX tools: sed, awk, grep
• Scripting languages: Perl, Python
and R
$ cat ufo_awesome.tsv | grep probe | wc -l
131
Hacking
Skills
While 80% of effort is spent here,
perhaps most straightforward to teach
Heavily tool focused, borrow from CS/EE curriculums
‣Comfort working at the command-line, with text editors
‣A language for every season!
Conveying findings in creative and compelling ways
Math &
Stats
Knowledge
If: Better data beats better math
Then: What methods should be
taught?
How do you find
structure in new data?
‣Scatter plots
‣Density plots
Data exploration that
scales
‣Reduce dimensionality
‣PCA, SVD, MDS
Methods must match
data
‣Text
‣Geospatial
‣Web-scale
What is the „best‟
model?
‣Most predictive
‣Most parsimonious
Explore Model
}
Math &
Stats
Knowledge
Universities good at methods
training...
...but what methods fit into Data
Science?
Things data scientist like...
‣Illustrating the current state of the
world
‣Predicting future observations
‣Classifying/ranking observations
Things social scientists like...
‣Testable theoretical models
‣Natural experiments
‣Causality
1. When applicable
2. Right tool / right job
3. Open black boxes
4. Learn limitations
Substantive
Expertise
Data Science, as a discipline, is
fundamentally about human behavior
Inquire Interpret
10
% 10
%
80
%
Focus on questions / not
tech
‣What new questions can be
asked from web-scale data?
‣Tools are a means to an end
Social science has
questions
‣Markets
‣Organization
How do we know when
the results we get make
sense, if ever?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/cawley/324240322
4/
Case Study: Methods for Collecting Large-
Scale Non-Expert Text Coding
Median Voter
Theorem
Theorem: In a majority rules system, the preference of the median voter will succeed
http://thomasmoreinstitute.wordpress.com/2010/04/28/the-uk-election-and-the-curse-of-the-median-
voter/
Assumption: The political/ideological preferences of voters can be projected onto a
single numeric dimension
Median Voter
Theorem
http://voteview.com/blog/?p=5
How do we calculate these numbers?
We make it
up...
http://www.flickr.com/photos/estherlairlandesa/46495660
But, we have
to!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Obama_Health_Care_Speech_to_Joint_Session_of_Congre
ss.jpg
http://www.flickr.com/photos/becca02/672719355
7/
A tale of two
disciplines
Physics Political Science
Build instrument Measure Observe action Infer
One thing we have a lot of:
text
Politicians
‣Speeches
‣Constituent communication
Parties
‣Platform / manifestos
‣Position statements
Countries
‣Diplomatic cables
‣Military declarations
Expert
Coding
!
How expert coding (typically)
works
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Official_Monster_Raving_Loony_Party
Expert Code Book
1. Health & Safety: We propose to ban Self Responsibilty on the grounds that it
may be dangerous to your health.
2. M.P‟s Expenses: We propose that instead of a second home allowance M.P‟s
will have a caravan which will be parked outside the Houses of Parliament. This
will make it easier as flipping a caravan is easier than flipping homes
3. Eurofit: The European Constitution which will be sorted out by going for a long
Walk. “As everyone knows that walking is good for the constitution”Manifesto
Party Year Score
Monster Raving Loony 2010 -2
DATA!
What‟s wrong with
experts?
They‟re
slow
They‟re
biased
They‟re
expensive
They‟re
wrong
Can we use non-
experts to code
political
manifestos?
How can we
measure the
quality/validity of
non-expert
codings?
Use Mechanical
Turk to code
many manifesto
fragments.
Experimental
approach
Expert
codings
Texts: 18 “big 3” British party
manifestos 1987-2010
Experts: 5 advanced poli. sci.
graduate students + 2
tenured faculty
Coding: deliberately simple
schema
Baseline data
Three experiments
No
Qualification
Low-
Threshold
High-
Threshold
Anyone in 4/6 Correct 5/6 Correct
MT
codings
Experimental design
Hypothesis: Stronger filter on
Turkers leads to better coding
Filter: Use MT qualification
test as gatekeeper
How do we think about coding a manifesto
fragment?
Example text coding HIT from the experiment
How do we implement this (aka, the glue)?
Expert
codings
[{ ‘text_unit_id’: ...,
‘sentence_text’: ...,
....
},
...
]
Random sample, as
JSON
EC2
S3
MT
Dynamically generate
HITs
MT
codings
Push HITs + retrieve
results
Statistical
analysis
of results
Scholarship,
FTW!
https://github.com/drewconway/mturk_coder_qua
lity
What‟s good about MT non-
experts?
They‟re
fast
They‟re
biased?
They‟re
cheap
They‟re
wrong?
The last crowd-sourced
coding job for 600
sentences and got
4,300 sentences coded
in about 20 hours
(about 3.6 sentences
per minute)
• We pay about $0.02 /
sentence
• Typical manifesto (in British
set) has 1,000 sentences
• Whole manifesto coded for
$20
• By comparison, the CMP
pays expert coders about
€150 per manifesto, call it
€.15 or $.20/manifesto - 10x
more per sentence
Results Kappa Statistic
Experiment Sentences # MT Coders % Agreement k* Std. Error z
No Qual. 1,315 89 0.65 0.47 0.13 22.6
Low-Threshold 1,393 56 0.7 0.54 0.12 26.7
High-Threshold 1,250 23 0.62 0.41 0.13 18.3
* A k value between 0.4-0.6 is considered “moderate” agreement
Agreement by experiment
Experiment Expert Coding MT % Agreement
No Qual.
Economic 0.77
Social 0.92
Neither 0.22
Low-Threshold
Economic 0.87
Social 0.98
Neither 0.2
High-Threshold
Economic 0.77
Social 0.91
Neither 0.09
Agreement by expert-coding
Results of initial MT experiments
Results Kappa Statistic
Experiment Sentences # MT Coders % Agreement k* Std. Error z
Econ-only 942 15 0.62 0.23 0.1 4.28
Soc-only 955 32 0.6 0.17 0.09 0.95
* A k value between 0.4-0.6 is considered “moderate” agreement
Experiment Expert Coding MT % Agreement
Economic 0.92
Economic-only Neither 0.28
Social 0.97
Social-only Neither 0.19
Non-experts have
a very hard time
with a “null” coding!
Separating Social and Economic Sentences
Joint work
with...
Michael Laver
NYU
Kenneth Bennoit
LSE
Slava Mikhaylov
UCL
Paper: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2260437
Presentation: http://bit.ly/nonexperts
Project
Florida
No Qualification
Coder performance
stability
Low-threshold
High-threshold
Performance
becomes very stable
after approximately
20 HITs
Party shifts: economic
Party shifts: social

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Drew Conway: A Social Scientist's Perspective on Data Science

  • 1. A social scientist‟s perspectives on data science Drew Conway NYC Data Science Meetup March 5, 2013http://www.flickr.com/photos/uiowa/804719510 0/
  • 2.
  • 3. Hacking Skills Obtain Munge I hold the following truths to be self- evident... 1. Data come from many sources 2. Data come in many form(at)s 10 % 10 % 80 % A .zip file of PDFs ≠ data ‣Data scientist must know where to get data and how to obtain it ‣Work with big text files $ head publicvotes-20101018_votes.dump ‣Work with APIs $ curl http://search.twitter.com/search.json?q=@dr ewconway > drewconway.json Real data are messy ‣Even curated data: duplicates, missing values, date formats ‣Combine data from multiple sources/formats ‣Tools • *NIX tools: sed, awk, grep • Scripting languages: Perl, Python and R $ cat ufo_awesome.tsv | grep probe | wc -l 131
  • 4. Hacking Skills While 80% of effort is spent here, perhaps most straightforward to teach Heavily tool focused, borrow from CS/EE curriculums ‣Comfort working at the command-line, with text editors ‣A language for every season! Conveying findings in creative and compelling ways
  • 5. Math & Stats Knowledge If: Better data beats better math Then: What methods should be taught? How do you find structure in new data? ‣Scatter plots ‣Density plots Data exploration that scales ‣Reduce dimensionality ‣PCA, SVD, MDS Methods must match data ‣Text ‣Geospatial ‣Web-scale What is the „best‟ model? ‣Most predictive ‣Most parsimonious Explore Model
  • 6. } Math & Stats Knowledge Universities good at methods training... ...but what methods fit into Data Science? Things data scientist like... ‣Illustrating the current state of the world ‣Predicting future observations ‣Classifying/ranking observations Things social scientists like... ‣Testable theoretical models ‣Natural experiments ‣Causality 1. When applicable 2. Right tool / right job 3. Open black boxes 4. Learn limitations
  • 7. Substantive Expertise Data Science, as a discipline, is fundamentally about human behavior Inquire Interpret 10 % 10 % 80 % Focus on questions / not tech ‣What new questions can be asked from web-scale data? ‣Tools are a means to an end Social science has questions ‣Markets ‣Organization How do we know when the results we get make sense, if ever?
  • 8. http://www.flickr.com/photos/cawley/324240322 4/ Case Study: Methods for Collecting Large- Scale Non-Expert Text Coding
  • 9. Median Voter Theorem Theorem: In a majority rules system, the preference of the median voter will succeed http://thomasmoreinstitute.wordpress.com/2010/04/28/the-uk-election-and-the-curse-of-the-median- voter/ Assumption: The political/ideological preferences of voters can be projected onto a single numeric dimension
  • 13. One thing we have a lot of: text Politicians ‣Speeches ‣Constituent communication Parties ‣Platform / manifestos ‣Position statements Countries ‣Diplomatic cables ‣Military declarations Expert Coding !
  • 14. How expert coding (typically) works http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Official_Monster_Raving_Loony_Party Expert Code Book 1. Health & Safety: We propose to ban Self Responsibilty on the grounds that it may be dangerous to your health. 2. M.P‟s Expenses: We propose that instead of a second home allowance M.P‟s will have a caravan which will be parked outside the Houses of Parliament. This will make it easier as flipping a caravan is easier than flipping homes 3. Eurofit: The European Constitution which will be sorted out by going for a long Walk. “As everyone knows that walking is good for the constitution”Manifesto Party Year Score Monster Raving Loony 2010 -2 DATA!
  • 16. Can we use non- experts to code political manifestos? How can we measure the quality/validity of non-expert codings? Use Mechanical Turk to code many manifesto fragments.
  • 17. Experimental approach Expert codings Texts: 18 “big 3” British party manifestos 1987-2010 Experts: 5 advanced poli. sci. graduate students + 2 tenured faculty Coding: deliberately simple schema Baseline data Three experiments No Qualification Low- Threshold High- Threshold Anyone in 4/6 Correct 5/6 Correct MT codings Experimental design Hypothesis: Stronger filter on Turkers leads to better coding Filter: Use MT qualification test as gatekeeper
  • 18. How do we think about coding a manifesto fragment?
  • 19. Example text coding HIT from the experiment
  • 20. How do we implement this (aka, the glue)? Expert codings [{ ‘text_unit_id’: ..., ‘sentence_text’: ..., .... }, ... ] Random sample, as JSON EC2 S3 MT Dynamically generate HITs MT codings Push HITs + retrieve results Statistical analysis of results Scholarship, FTW! https://github.com/drewconway/mturk_coder_qua lity
  • 21. What‟s good about MT non- experts? They‟re fast They‟re biased? They‟re cheap They‟re wrong? The last crowd-sourced coding job for 600 sentences and got 4,300 sentences coded in about 20 hours (about 3.6 sentences per minute) • We pay about $0.02 / sentence • Typical manifesto (in British set) has 1,000 sentences • Whole manifesto coded for $20 • By comparison, the CMP pays expert coders about €150 per manifesto, call it €.15 or $.20/manifesto - 10x more per sentence
  • 22. Results Kappa Statistic Experiment Sentences # MT Coders % Agreement k* Std. Error z No Qual. 1,315 89 0.65 0.47 0.13 22.6 Low-Threshold 1,393 56 0.7 0.54 0.12 26.7 High-Threshold 1,250 23 0.62 0.41 0.13 18.3 * A k value between 0.4-0.6 is considered “moderate” agreement Agreement by experiment Experiment Expert Coding MT % Agreement No Qual. Economic 0.77 Social 0.92 Neither 0.22 Low-Threshold Economic 0.87 Social 0.98 Neither 0.2 High-Threshold Economic 0.77 Social 0.91 Neither 0.09 Agreement by expert-coding Results of initial MT experiments
  • 23. Results Kappa Statistic Experiment Sentences # MT Coders % Agreement k* Std. Error z Econ-only 942 15 0.62 0.23 0.1 4.28 Soc-only 955 32 0.6 0.17 0.09 0.95 * A k value between 0.4-0.6 is considered “moderate” agreement Experiment Expert Coding MT % Agreement Economic 0.92 Economic-only Neither 0.28 Social 0.97 Social-only Neither 0.19 Non-experts have a very hard time with a “null” coding! Separating Social and Economic Sentences
  • 24. Joint work with... Michael Laver NYU Kenneth Bennoit LSE Slava Mikhaylov UCL Paper: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2260437 Presentation: http://bit.ly/nonexperts