Also called: Research Coder, Qualitative Data Coder
Reads interviews, news articles, or social media posts and tags them by theme so researchers can study patterns.
A content coder reads hundreds of interview transcripts, tags each passage with codes like "housing stress" or "family support", and checks agreement with other coders.
Approximate: anchored on Bureau of Labor Statistics data for a broader job group.
Bachelor's degree (4-year), about 4 years after high school. Bachelor's in a social science.
Ways in: 4-year college. Training cost: $15k – $60k.
Majors to look at: Sociology, Anthropology, Political Science.
Growing faster than average (about 5% over 10 years). BLS 2025-35 projection band for SOC 19-4061: Faster than average (5% to 6%).
High risk for 10 years. AI now tags text by theme at scale; people mostly check its quality, so few dedicated coding jobs remain.
Classes: AP English Language, AP Psychology, Computer applications.
Official data: O*NET occupation 19-4061.
Career Universe is an early version. Pay, training and AI-risk figures are estimates to start your own research, not verified facts. The research was written with AI research assistants, checked by validation scripts and spot-checked by hand. Check anything important with schools, employers and official sources. How the numbers work.