Introduction

Welcome to this introduction to R and R Studio for absolute beginners. This book is designed first and foremost for College of DuPage students in Sociology 1205 (Introduction to Data Science) and Sociology 2200 (Introduction to Research Methods). But it can be just as easily used by anyone looking to learn the basics of the R language in the R Studio environment. In addition, this book is written specifically for people with absolutely no experience in coding or data science.  In other words, this book is the absolute starting point.

For those College of DuPage students working with this book as part of Sociology 1205 or 2200, you will encounter interactive modules to check your knowledge and understanding as we go. In such a case, it will look like this:

I should note, though, that even though this book is designed for absolute beginners, it does not mean it’s easy. Learning to code is similar to learning a new language and there is a learning curve. Like any language, R, the computational language we are going to learn here, has its own vocabulary and syntax. Moreover, you are going to learn R in the context of learning about data science and/or research methods. This means that the level of learning is doubled: this is like learning to speak and write in a new language to talk about a field in which you are completely new. So there is a double learning curve.

Because of this double learning curve, I highly recommend not trying to do all the work, especially not on the day of the deadline. On the contrary, you must practice a little every day and, for those of you taking the credit classes mentioned above, not leave it all to the day of the deadline.

The goal of this book is to get you started and ready for the rest of the classes. I recommend completing at least one chapter a day before getting to the assignment.

The best way to use this book is to follow along with the code, as opposed to passively watching the videos. As you watch the videos, open a separate browser tab, open a new script in R Studio Cloud, and type up the code from the videos. This will get you used to writing code when we get to the more sophisticated work. Also take notes of the things you want to remember.

Good luck as you start your journey into the world of data science and research methods.