Categorizing representatives' precongressional experiences using automated coding

Author / Creator

Pluta, Anne C., author

Available as

Online

Summary

This case study describes research for our forthcoming book, Gendering Experience: Pre-congressional Career Experience of Women in the House (New York University Press). Specifically, we detail the...

This case study describes research for our forthcoming book, Gendering Experience: Pre-congressional Career Experience of Women in the House (New York University Press). Specifically, we detail the process we used to automate the coding of precongressional career experience for every representative serving in the US Congress from 1917 to 2022 (more than 4000 representatives in total). We illustrate how to develop and refine coding categories in text analysis and show some of the challenges we overcame in the process of coding and analyzing representatives' experiences. We also identify some limitations of automated coding and provide suggestions for how scholars and students might use supervised automation in their text analysis work to overcome said challenges.

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