 Ceilings and FloorsGary Goertz, Tony Hak and Jan Dul Sociological Methods & Research, 2013, vol. 42, issue 1, 3-40 Abstract: There are situations where the data or the theory suggest or require, respectively, that one estimate the boundary lines that separate regions of observations from regions of no observations. Of particular interest are ceiling or floor lines. For example, many theories use terms such as veto player, constraint, only if, and so on, which suggest ceilings. Ceiling hypotheses have a nonstandard form claiming the probability of Y Â will be zero for all values of Y Â greater than the ceiling value of Y c for a given value of X . Conversely, ceiling hypotheses make no specific prediction about the value of Y for a given value of X Â except that it will be less than the ceiling value. Floors work by guaranteeing minimum levels. The article gives numerous examples of theories that imply ceiling or floor hypotheses and numerous examples of data that fit such hypotheses. The article proposes quantile regression as a means of estimating the boundaries of the no-data zone as well as criteria for evaluating the importance of the boundary variable. These techniques are illustrated for ceiling and floor hypotheses relating gross domestic product/capita and democracy. Keywords: QCA; necessary conditions; quantile regression; GDP/capita; democracy; veto player (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:somere:v:42:y:2013:i:1:p:3-40 Access Statistics for this article More articles in Sociological Methods & Research |
Is your work missing from RePEc? Here is how to contribute.
Questions or problems? Check the EconPapers FAQ or send mail to .
EconPapers is hosted by the
School of Business at Örebro University.