October 23, 2015
Where Are They Now?: The success of government responses to the Great Recession in Chile and Argentina
Chile and Argentina went through a recession from 2008 to 2009 during the global Great Recession. My senior research project compares the success of government responses to the Great Recession in Chile and Argentina. In order to better understand how successful government policies were, I intend to compare public opinion to trends suggested by quantitative data. (GDP per capita cannot convey income gaps, for example, however widespread frustration about income gaps hypothetically can.) I surveyed 400 people in Buenos Aires, Argentina and 400 people in Santiago, Chile so that I can run regressions on my survey results. My surveys were designed to learn how the typical Chilean and Argentine citizen feels about the performance of their nation’s economy since the Great Recession through simple—yet secretly loaded— yes/no questions.
Like the other members of my panel, I found that positivity and the people involved in my research played a huge role in the success of my research endeavors. When surveying 50 strangers for at least 3 hours per day every day in all kinds of weather, a person must keep a positive attitude if she wishes to have a somewhat enjoyable experience and distribute surveys in a timely manner. (I quickly learned that nobody wants to fill out a survey for someone who looks grumpy!) Not only was my research (the distribution of surveys) impossible without the people involved, but this lesson about the usefulness of positivity made my research experience unforgettable. I got to meet hundreds of wonderful, generous people and collect lots of valuable data for my senior research project. I'm glad I learned early in my research experience to axe-cent-tú-ate (accentuate) the positive!
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