asr-theory-building
Use when building the theoretical argument of an American Sociological Review (ASR) manuscript into a portable contribution — for quantitative, demographic, comparative-historical, ethnographic, network, or computational work. ASR rewards a mechanism that travels over a setting-bound finding. Structures the argument; it does not run analyses.
Profile →npx skills add brycewang-stanford/Awesome-Journal-Skills --skill asr-theory-building --agent claude-code
Same command for any agent — swap --agent for codex, cursor, copilot.
Weekly change comes from our own snapshots, not the repository page — it measures attention, not adoption.
# Theory & Argument Building (asr-theory-building) At ASR a finding becomes a contribution when it is attached to a **theoretical argument other sociologists can use.** This skill turns evidence into theory: explicit mechanisms, scope conditions, and concepts, in the idiom appropriate to your method. ## When to trigger - The empirics are strong but the "so what / why" is thin - A reviewer said the paper is "atheoretical," "merely descriptive," or "case-bound" - You need to state the mechanism, the concepts, and where the argument holds - Reconciling rich case material (ethnography/history) with a general claim ## Build the argument (by mode of work) ### Quantitative / demographic 1. **Concept** — define key constructs (e.g., the form of inequality, mobility, the social process) and distinguish them from neighbors. 2. **Mechanism** — the social process generating the pattern: who, why, under what structural conditions. 3. **Observable implications** — what we should and should not see if the mechanism operates; these become tests in `asr-research-design`. 4. **Scope conditions** — populations, periods, contexts where the argument holds. ### Comparative-historical - Build the argumen
- When to trigger
- Build the argument (by mode of work)
- Quantitative / demographic
- Comparative-historical
- Ethnographic / interview
- Network / computational
- The "portability" test (ASR-specific)
- What "theoretical contribution" means to an ASR referee
- Worked micro-example (illustrative)
- Referee pushback → ASR-specific fix
- Calibration anchors
- Anti-patterns
- Output format
- Supplementary resources
What does the asr-theory-building skill do?
Use when building the theoretical argument of an American Sociological Review (ASR) manuscript into a portable contribution — for quantitative, demographic, comparative-historical, ethnographic, network, or computational work. ASR rewards a mechanism that travels over a setting-bound finding. Structures the argument; it does not run analyses.
How do I install it?
Run `npx skills add brycewang-stanford/Awesome-Journal-Skills --skill asr-theory-building --agent claude-code` — it drops the skill into your project so the agent can pick it up. Swap the --agent value for codex, cursor or copilot if you use one of those.
Where does this skill come from?
From brycewang-stanford/Awesome-Journal-Skills, a repository with 909 stars. We read it straight from the repository tree rather than a submitted listing, so what you see here is what is actually published.
Is a popular skill a good skill?
Not necessarily. Stars measure attention, not adoption — a repository can trend for a week and be abandoned. That is why we show the weekly change from our own snapshots next to the total, instead of a single flattering number.