About 20 interviewers - ranging in occupations from housewives to students - sit at cubicles in the basement of Berkey Hall, each calling people to compile research on anything from who they're planning to vote for to whether they have ever had prostate cancer.

That information is then entered into the database, compiled and used to write reports and is often used by MSU professors in studies, said Katherine Cusick, director of the Survey Research Interviewing Facility.

The workers are part of the Office for Survey Research, through the Institute for Public Policy & Social Research. About 120 people are hired for the job.

"It's vitally important legal and academic information and it's important for the people that govern," Cusick said. "They need data to make decisions so they can base their decisions on people's behaviors and practices."

Cusick said despite the sometimes sensitive nature of their questions - they inquire about sexual partners and feelings on terrorism - many people are open and answer questions.

"There's a certain percentage of people who are private, but there's a much larger portion who are willing to help out."

The institute, which runs the survey office, works to create a connection between research done at MSU and decisions in the Legislature. The institute also trains people to run for public office, Director Douglas Roberts said.

"We try to provide an opportunity for research at MSU," Roberts said. "And we are there to provide outreach to people who make policy in this state."

Associate Dean of Research and Graduate Studies David Campbell said the institute helps researching professors and students by giving them data they have gathered.

"The survey research enhances our methods and skills," Campbell said. "It gives us a real understanding of what's going on in public policy so we can respond to that."

Survey and political work are just a few of several research units and projects in the College of Social Science.

Campbell said the college receives about $11 million in grant funding each year, which has doubled in the last seven years. The college received 114 externally funded research grants from organizations such as the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, NASA and the state of Michigan.

"We have a lot of unusual research projects you might not expect us to have," Campbell said.

Those projects include health-related and environmental issues and psychological research, which Campbell said garners hundreds of thousands of dollars every year. Each researcher in the department receives grant funding for their projects.

"The 50 faculty in the psychology department receive about $100,000 a year per faculty member," Campbell said.

Campbell also said the schools in the college - criminal justice, social work and labor and industry relations - help bring in research money as well. That money helps the college do the kind of projects it would like to do without worrying too much about funding, and the university provides the time, he said.

Campbell said the college's research contributes research jobs and grant money to the university, but it makes less tangible, but equally as important, contributions in knowledge.

"There is the intellectual contribution that they make, because our research takes us across campus," Campbell said.

There are more varied research units in the college as well, such as in international issues and geography.

The Center for Advanced Study of International Development works with professors to secure grants and funding for their research projects.

"The center was basically created to be the focal point of international activity in the social sciences," center Director Jeffrey Riedinger said. "The mission was to improve cross-cultural disciplines in research and teaching."

Riedinger said the faculty at the center come from all different colleges, many in the social sciences. The center gets about $450,000 from the U.S. Department of Education and the U.S. Department of State for its work.

"On any given day, we would probably have some part of the staff working to get external funding for their research or for perhaps teaching and outreach activities," Riedinger said. "Or we might be hosting a visiting scholar who might be here to do presentations. Other staff might be working with faculty members who are interested in working to improve international content in their courses."

Besides working with MSU faculty, the center also sponsors Linking All Types of Teachers to International Cross-Cultural Education, or LATTICE.

"LATTICE is a group of K-12 educators from Okemos and Holt getting together with international students in the area to learn more about what they can do to internationalize the classroom," Riedinger said.

Also on campus, the Remote Sensing & Geographic Information Science Research and Outreach Services works with MSU and private companies to get historical and current geographic information.

"We provide research and outreach services for on- and off-campus clientele," research services Director Jessica Moy said.

The outreach services received funding exclusively from grants and funds without money from MSU. Moy said the program also has worked with the City of East Lansing to provide online maps of the city in the 1930s and the last decade.

"We do a lot of aerial imagery work and have the largest supply of historic imagery in Michigan," Moy said. "We work in all sorts of areas on campus, in the medical school to criminal justice to urban planning."

Campbell said all of the research benefits the college and the community.

"I like to call it 'science in the interest of society,'" he said.