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Quantitative Content Analysis of Chinese Texts?: A Methodological Note

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Abstract

This paper discusses the quantitative measurement of Chinese texts using hand-coded analysis, Yoshikoder and Wordscores. The paper compares the advantages and disadvantages of each method using the example of the 2008 melamine-tainted milk scandal in China. The policy positions estimated by Yoshikoder are not too different from those using hand-coded analysis. Yoshikoder outperforms Wordscores, but with substantial human intervention.

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Notes

  1. Jonathan Sullivan and Will Lowe [12].

  2. Jonathan Sullivan and Bettina Renz [13].

  3. Michael Laver et al. [5].

  4. Robert Klemmensen et al. [3].

  5. Robert Klemmensen et al. [3]; Heike Klüver [4]; Kenneth Benoit and Michael Laver [1]; Michael Laver et al. [5].

  6. Will Lowe [6, 7].

  7. Heike Klüver [4].

  8. Heike Klüver [4]; Kenneth Benoit and Michael Laver [1]; Michael Laver et al. [5].

  9. Will Lowe [6, 7].

  10. Will Lowe [6, 7].

  11. Christine Mahoney [8]; Schneider, Gerald and Konstantin Baltz [11].

  12. James M. Carlson and Mark S. Hyde [2].

  13. For instance, see Lawrence, Dune. 2008. China Says Sanlu Milk Likely Contaminated by Melamine (Update 1). Bloomberg (September 12 2008). http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=at6LcKJB6YA8&refer=asia (accessed July. 3, 2010).

  14. Coding forms can be obtained at http://www.yuwenjuliechen.com/research.

  15. It is better that reference texts can represent “each extreme position on the dimension”. I seek to find texts that represent the five pre-defined positions. See Robert Klemmensen et al. [3].

  16. The STATA command can be found at http://www.yuwenjuliechen.com/research.

  17. Michael Laver et al. [5]; Martin Lanny W. and Georg Vanberg [9].

  18. Fuchun Peng et al. [10].

References

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Acknowledgements

This paper was completed during my postdoctoral stay at the Chair of International Politics at the University of Konstanz in Germany and at the Institute for Human Security at La Trobe University in Australia. For financial support for my project on “The Rise of Group Interests and Evidences of Interest Articulation in China” (Taiwan NSC98-2917-I-564-147), I would like to thank Taiwan’s National Science Council. John James Kennedy has commented thoroughly on my earlier draft. I wish to thank him for his assistance.

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  1. Institute of Political Science, Academia Sinica, 128 Academia Rd, Sec 2, 11529, Taipei City, Taiwan

    Yu-Wen Chen

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Correspondence to Yu-Wen Chen.

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Chen, YW. Quantitative Content Analysis of Chinese Texts?: A Methodological Note. J OF CHIN POLIT SCI 16, 431–443 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11366-011-9164-0

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11366-011-9164-0

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