ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with clickers indicating that they provide a technology to identify and explore issues of particular relevance to the social sciences. Clickers are uniquely suited to trouble the assumptions students often carry into the classroom around issues of class, race, gender, religion, income inequality, and political ideologies. They allow students to experiment with the framing of social science questions and the way research into such questions is communicated through social and mass media. And they allow a level of anonymity in responses that, if used carefully, can raise controversial subjects in a way that encourages students to rethink their own positions and respect the positions of their classmates. Survey research methodologies occupy a central role across most of the social science disciplines, particularly those making broadly generalizable claims through large sample sizes. Students replicate the surveys reported in the media with their classmates using the clickers.
