Software
Together with my coauthors, I have written R packages that have been installed hundreds of thousands of times by researchers working around the world. Read more about them below.
Visualization
dotwhisker
dotwhisker is an R package for quickly and easily generating dot-and-whisker plots of regression results, either directly from model objects or from tidy data frames. It provides a convenient way to create highly customizable plots for presenting and comparing statistics. It can be used to plot coefficients or other estimates (e.g., predicted probabilities) within a model or compare them across different models. The estimates are presented as dots with confidence interval whiskers.
To install:
- the latest released version:
install.packages("dotwhisker"). - the latest development version:
remotes::install_github("fsolt/dotwhisker").
More details are available at:
https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/dotwhisker/vignettes/dotwhisker-vignette.html
interplot
interplot is a tool for plotting the conditional coefficients (“marginal effects”) of variables included in multiplicative interaction terms. The function plots the changes in the coefficient of one variable in a two-way interaction term conditional on the value of the other included variable. The resulting plot also includes simulated 95% confidential intervals of these coefficients.
To install:
- the latest released version:
install.packages("interplot"). - the latest development version:
remotes::install_github("sammo3182/interplot").
More details are available at:
https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/interplot/vignettes/interplot-vignette.html
Dynamic Comparative Public Opinion
DCPOtools
Solt, Frederick, Yuehong Cassandra Tai, Yue Hu, Hyein Ko, and Byung-Deuk Woo. 2019. “DCPOtools: Tools for Preparing Survey Data for DCPO.” https://github.com/fsolt/DCPOtools.
Dynamic Comparative Public Opinion (DCPO) analyses generate estimates of latent public opinion that are comparable across countries and over time from hundreds or thousands of surveys, but collecting and formatting these survey data is a formidable challenge. The DCPOtools package streamlines these initial steps, providing tools for downloading survey datasets, extracting the needed data, correctly identifying and standardizing the countries and years surveyed, applying survey weights, and arranging the resulting information into the format required to generate DCPO estimates.
To install:
DCPOtools is not available on CRAN. Install its latest version with the following command: remotes::install_github("fsolt/DCPOtools")
DCPO
Solt, Frederick. 2020. “DCPO: Dynamic Comparative Public Opinion.” The Comprehensive R Archive Network (CRAN).
The study of comparative public opinion has been hampered by data that is sparse, that is, unavailable for many countries and years; incomparable, i.e., ostensibly addressing the same issue but generated by different survey items; or, most often, both. DCPO is an R package for estimating latent public opinion from cross-national survey data to maximize the information gleaned from available sources, overcome issues of missing and incomparable data, and allow comparativists to examine the dynamics of public opinion across countries.
For a detailed description, see the paper here.
To install:
- the latest released version:
install.packages("DCPO", dependencies = TRUE) - the latest development version:
remotes::install_github("fsolt/DCPO", dependencies = TRUE)
Note that DCPO depends on stan. So, please install rstan and rstantools first. See the detailed instructions here.
Windows users may encounter some issues when installing DCPO due to the version or system settings. We recommend installing the proper version of R and Stanheaders package first.
Note: Development of CmdStan, available on R via CmdStanR, has far outstripped that of the rstan package on which DCPO is based. DCPO estimates can now be generated much, much faster (wallclock times of < 2%) by passing the DCPO Stan file to CmdStanR. See here for an example.
Reproducible Data Retrieval
ropercenter
The ropercenter package provides programmatic, reproducible access to Roper Center datasets from within R for registered users at the Roper Center’s member institutions.
To install:
- the latest released version:
install.packages("ropercenter") - the latest development version:
remotes::install_github("fsolt/ropercenter")
For more details, check out the vignette.
Please recall that by using Roper Center services, you accept the Center’s Terms and Conditions.
icpsrdata
icpsrdata is an R package that provides reproducible, programmatic access to datasets stored in the Inter-university Consortium for Political and Social Research archive.
To install:
- the latest released version:
install.packages("icpsrdata") - the latest development version:
remotes::install_github("fsolt/icpsrdata")
For more details, check out the vignette.
Please recall that by using ICPSR’s services, you accept its Terms and Conditions.
pewdata
Solt, Frederick, and Yue Hu. 2016. pewdata: Reproducible Retrieval of Pew Research Center Datasets. The Comprehensive R Archive Network (CRAN).
pewdata is an R package that provides reproducible, programmatic access to survey datasets from the Pew Research Center.
To install:
- the latest released version:
install.packages("pewdata") - the latest development version:
remotes::install_github("fsolt/pewdata")
For more details, check out the vignette.
Please note that by downloading data from the Pew Research Center, you accept the Center’s Terms and Conditions.
gesisdata
gesisdata is an R package that provides reproducible, programmatic access from within R to the datasets stored in the GESIS Data Archive Data Archive for registered users.
To install:
- the latest released version:
install.packages("gesisdata") - the latest development version:
remotes::install_github("fsolt/gesisdata")
For more details, check out the vignette.
Please recall that by using the GESIS Data Archive, you accept its terms and conditions.