PhD studentship Social Statistics University of Manchester

Topics in Survey Methodology

Location:  School of Social Sciences, Oxford Road, University of  Manchester

Closing Date:   17^th January 2014

Project Supervisors:  Prof. Natalie Shlomo and Dr. Alan Marshall

We offer the opportunity for a fully funded PhD studentship within the Survey Methods and Analysis Group of the Cathie Marsh Centre for Census and Survey Research (CCSR) on all topics related to Survey Methodology. We particularly welcome applications on the following topics although other topics can be proposed by the applicants:

·           Survey design with an emphasis on adaptive and responsive designs;

·           Data integration with emphasis on developing optimal ways to integrate data from different sources, e.g. census, administrative data, survey data;

·           Mixed-mode data collection with an emphasis on reducing total survey error, modelling response propensities and measuring the quality of response;

·           Analysis of complex survey designs with an emphasis on variance estimation and correct inference;

·           Small area estimation including applications for  skewed distributions subject to outliers;

·           Analysis of non-response bias with emphasis on mitigating this bias at data collection and the development and evaluation of techniques to compensate for both unit and item non-response;

·           Development of weighting and estimation procedures for the analysis of survey data.

·           Statistical disclosure control;

·           Statistical data editing with an emphasis on new methods for imputation.

Further details about our research group, Survey Methods and Analysis within the Cathie Marsh Centre for Census and Survey Research at the University of Manchester is at:    http://www.ccsr.ac.uk/ssrg/

Candidates must have or expect to gain a first or strong upper second class degree in a relevant discipline within the Social Sciences or Mathematics.

For those who would like to apply to the Social Statistics studentship, please send a brief proposal and academic CV to Professor Natalie Shlomo, Social Statistics Discipline at: Natalie.Shlomo@manchester.ac.uk by the 17^th January 2014. 

Note that this date is before the deadline of the Northwest Doctoral Training Centre where applicants living in the United Kingdom can apply for PhD studentships by the 3^rd February 2014 with the application to the School of Social Sciences due on the 17^th of January 2014. See http://www.manchester.ac.uk/postgraduate/funding/search/display/?id=00000293&offset=1&sort=name&sortdir=ascending&subjectArea=Any&studyLevel=PGR&nationality=United%20Kingdom&submit=Search for more information. Also, please visit:  http://www.nwdtc.ac.uk/prospective.html .  We would expect eligible UK candidates to apply to that funding source as well.  

European Union (EU)  and international students outside of the EU are invited to apply but note that for international students, the studentship will only cover ‘home’ tuition fees so that extra funding may be required.