Quantifying the Qualitative: Learn More from Case Studies with Information Analytics
Katya Drozdova is an associate professor of political science in the School of Business, Government, and Economics at Seattle Pacific University. Dr. Drozdova will use information theory to lay out a systematic approach to comparative case studies, drawing on her recent book titled Quantifying the Qualitative: Information Theory for Comparative Case Analysis (SAGE, 2016). This new methodology requires minimal quantitative skills, while helping students, educators, researchers, and decision makers learn more from comparative case studies than has been possible before. The approach bypasses the limitations of traditional statistics in small-n contexts, enabling analysts to systematically assess and compare the impact of a set of factors on case outcomes. This method empowers you with easy-to-use analytics that will reduce uncertainty and improve knowledge gained from your case studies. It also provides you with straightforward yet rigorous information metrics that will hone your research design – and help you more effectively communicate your findings to diverse audiences of scholars and practitioners.