Academic blogsite

Biography

I work at the Department of Sociology of the University of Bucharest, teaching social statistics, research methodology and measurement in the social sciences.

I am also the National Coordinator of the ESS - European Social Survey, and Director of the RODA - Romanian Social Data Archive, being involved in data archiving for more than 20 years in partnership with the CESSDA - Council of European Social Science Data Archives.

My activity in the domain of research infrastructures was acknowledged both nationally, appointed as a member of the CRIC - Romanian Committee for Research Infrastructures, and internationally as a former Romanian delegate to ESFRI - European Strategy Forum for Research Infrastructures, where I chaired the SCI-SWG - Social and Cultural Innovation Strategy Working Group between 2012 and 2014.

My primary research interest is QCA - Qualitative Comparative Analysis, a novel methodology for social research that inspires a growing community for which I serve as a member of the Advisory Board and Steering Committee at COMPASSS. I have published extensively on methodological aspects, with a key interest in the programming of the minimization algorithms. My main programming environment is R (see also R-omania), for which I have contributed a number of packages, among which QCA for running Qualitative Comparative Analysis, DDIwR to convert to and from other statistical software, and declared for (finally) declaring missing values and labels in R.

Interests
  • Social Statistics
  • Research Methodology
  • Qualitative Comparative Analysis
Education
  • PhD in Sociology, 2008

    University of Bucharest

  • MA in Sociology, 1999

    University of Bucharest

  • BA in Sociology, 1997

    University of Bucharest

Experience

 
 
 
 
 
University of Bucharest, Department of Sociology
Professor
University of Bucharest, Department of Sociology
February 2002 – Present Bucharest, Romania
Teaching research methodology and statistics.
 
 
 
 
 
Romanian Social Data Archive (RODA)
Director
January 2001 – Present Bucharest, Romania
 
 
 
 
 
Institute for Quality of Life Research (ICCV)
Researcher
September 1998 – January 2002 Bucharest, Romania

Skills

R programming

75%

Statistics

70%

QCA

90%

Chess

30%

Database management

60%

Teaching

95%

Recent Publications

Search for relevant publications.
(2020). Comparative Analysis using Boolean Algebra. In SAGE Research Methods Foundations.

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(2020). Set Theoretic Methods. In The SAGE Handbook of Research Methods in Political Science and International Relations.

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(2020). Dispute Resolution and Collaborative Decision-Making: What Accounts for Their Effectiveness? The Case of Romania. Sustainability.

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(2014). A common agenda for the European Research Infrastructures in the Social Sciences and Humanities. In Facing the Future. European Research Infrastructures for the Humanities and Social Sciences.

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Software

My programming environment of choice is R, because it is a high level software and it automatically does memory management when creating objects. It is the sort of language where users can focus on substantive issues, rather than pure programming.

The most important R package I’ve created is called QCA, which does Qualitative Comparative Analysis for all types of input data, that is binary crisp, multi-value crisp and fuzzy sets. This package is now used in many universities and summer schools all over the world.

I am currently working on a parallel version of the minimization algorithm, having a lot pf potential to increase the execution speed, function of the number of cores from the machine where the package is installed.

Linked to QCA is an independent package called venn, that creates Venn diagrams for up to 7 sets. It is specifically written for graphing entire sets or any other custom intersection, specified as a SOP (sum of products) expression.

Interpreting SOP expressions, as well as a good number of useful miscellanea functions, are tasks perfored by the admisc package.

Another package with a lot of potential is called DDIwR, having a number of useful functions based on the Data Documentation Initiative standard. It can also convert to and from various statistical formats, and it recently gained a graphical user interface, packed into a software called StatConverter.

Together with Emilian Hossu, I currently develop a new type of GUI generator for R, creating custom dialogs that are imported in a main application, employing ElectronJS from the Node.js environment. It uses webkit as a standard environment, so the created dialogs look exactly the same on the users’ machines.

One of the most promising recent R packages is called declared, which (finally) enables R users to declare multiple missing values. Since it is a new addition in the R ecosystem, this special type of object has an entire suite of associated functions, for instance to calculate weighted summaries even for the missing values.

All my R packages are listed in the R Universe.

Popular Topics

Consultancy

In my limited spare time I offer consultancy on topics related to sampling, basic statistical analysis and social research methodology. A significant part of my current training is dedicated to the R environment for statistical analysis and data management.

In a random order, this is a list of the institutions I have signed contracts with:

Contact

  • dusa.adrian@unibuc.ro
  • +40 740 147489
  • Soseaua Panduri 90-92, room 008, Bucharest, B 050663
  • Going uphill and keeping the Military Academy on your left, go right on Nicolae Paulescu street, walk pass a barrier at the corner with Ana Davila and walk straight until you hit the building of the Faculty of Sociology and Social Work.
  • DM Me
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