Download or read book Statistical Explanation and Statistical Relevance written by Wesley C. Salmon and published by University of Pittsburgh Pre. This book was released on 2010-11-23 with total page 129 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: According to modern physics, many objectively improbable events actually occur, such as the spontaneous disintegration of radioactive atoms. Because of high levels of improbability, scientists are often at a loss to explain such phenomena. In this main essay of this book, Wesley Salmon offers a solution to scientific explanation based on the concept of statistical relevance (the S-R model). In this vein, the other two essays herein discuss "Statistical Relevance vs. Statistical Inference," and "Explanation and Information."

Download or read book Statistical Explanation and Statistical Relevance written by Wesley C. Salmon and published by . This book was released on 1971-01-01 with total page 117 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Cult of Statistical Significance written by Stephen Thomas Ziliak and published by University of Michigan Press. This book was released on 2008-02-19 with total page 349 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How the most important statistical method used in many of the sciences doesn't pass the test for basic common sense

Download or read book The Significance Test Controversy written by Ramon E. Henkel and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2017-07-28 with total page 347 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Tests of significance have been a key tool in the research kit of behavioral scientists for nearly fifty years, but their widespread and uncritical use has recently led to a rising volume of controversy about their usefulness. This book gathers the central papers in this continuing debate, brings the issues into clear focus, points out practical problems and philosophical pitfalls involved in using the tests, and provides a benchmark from which further analysis can proceed.The papers deal with some of the basic philosophy of science, mathematical and statistical assumptions connected with significance tests and the problems of the interpretation of test results, but the work is essentially non-technical in its emphasis. The collection succeeds in raising a variety of questions about the value of the tests; taken together, the questions present a strong case for vital reform in test use, if not for their total abandonment in research.The book is designed for practicing researchers-those not extensively trained in mathematics and statistics that must nevertheless regularly decide if and how tests of significance are to be used-and for those training for research. While controversy has been centered in sociology and psychology, and the book will be especially useful to researchers and students in those fields, its importance is great across the spectrum of the scientific disciplines in which statistical procedures are essential-notably political science, economics, and the other social sciences, education, and many biological fields as well.Denton E. Morrison is professor, Department of Sociology, Michigan State University.Ramon E. Henkel is associate professor emeritus, Department of Sociology University of Maryland. He teaches as part of the graduate faculty.

Download or read book Statistical Power Analysis for the Behavioral Sciences written by Jacob Cohen and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-05-13 with total page 625 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Statistical Power Analysis is a nontechnical guide to power analysis in research planning that provides users of applied statistics with the tools they need for more effective analysis. The Second Edition includes: * a chapter covering power analysis in set correlation and multivariate methods; * a chapter considering effect size, psychometric reliability, and the efficacy of "qualifying" dependent variables and; * expanded power and sample size tables for multiple regression/correlation.

Download or read book Communication Research Statistics written by John C. Reinard and published by SAGE Publications. This book was released on 2006-04-20 with total page 604 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "While most books on statistics seem to be written as though targeting other statistics professors, John Reinard′s Communication Research Statistics is especially impressive because it is clearly intended for the student reader, filled with unusually clear explanations and with illustrations on the use of SPSS. I enjoyed reading this lucid, student-friendly book and expect students will benefit enormously from its content and presentation. Well done!" --John C. Pollock, The College of New Jersey Written in an accessible style using straightforward and direct language, Communication Research Statistics guides students through the statistics actually used in most empirical research undertaken in communication studies. This introductory textbook is the only work in communication that includes details on statistical analysis of data with a full set of data analysis instructions based on SPSS 12 and Excel XP. Key Features: Emphasizes basic and introductory statistical thinking: The basic needs of novice researchers and students are addressed, while underscoring the foundational elements of statistical analyses in research. Students learn how statistics are used to provide evidence for research arguments and how to evaluate such evidence for themselves. Prepares students to use statistics: Students are encouraged to use statistics as they encounter and evaluate quantitative research. The book details how statistics can be understood by developing actual skills to carry out rudimentary work. Examples are drawn from mass communication, speech communication, and communication disorders. Incorporates SPSS 12 and Excel: A distinguishing feature is the inclusion of coverage of data analysis by use of SPSS 12 and by Excel. Information on the use of major computer software is designed to let students use such tools immediately. Companion Web Site! A dedicated Web site includes a glossary, data sets, chapter summaries, additional readings, links to other useful sites, selected "calculators" for computation of related statistics, additional macros for selected statistics using Excel and SPSS, and extra chapters on multiple discriminant analysis and loglinear analysis. Intended Audience: Ideal for undergraduate and graduate courses in Communication Research Statistics or Methods; also relevant for many Research Methods courses across the social sciences

Download or read book Statistics Done Wrong written by Alex Reinhart and published by No Starch Press. This book was released on 2015-03-01 with total page 177 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Scientific progress depends on good research, and good research needs good statistics. But statistical analysis is tricky to get right, even for the best and brightest of us. You'd be surprised how many scientists are doing it wrong. Statistics Done Wrong is a pithy, essential guide to statistical blunders in modern science that will show you how to keep your research blunder-free. You'll examine embarrassing errors and omissions in recent research, learn about the misconceptions and scientific politics that allow these mistakes to happen, and begin your quest to reform the way you and your peers do statistics. You'll find advice on: –Asking the right question, designing the right experiment, choosing the right statistical analysis, and sticking to the plan –How to think about p values, significance, insignificance, confidence intervals, and regression –Choosing the right sample size and avoiding false positives –Reporting your analysis and publishing your data and source code –Procedures to follow, precautions to take, and analytical software that can help Scientists: Read this concise, powerful guide to help you produce statistically sound research. Statisticians: Give this book to everyone you know. The first step toward statistics done right is Statistics Done Wrong.

Download or read book Statistical Significance written by Siu L Chow and published by SAGE. This book was released on 1996 with total page 228 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This comprehensive and accessible book provides an overview of the central and most fundamental methodological issue for empirical researchers - how should we interpret statistical significance? Beginning with a thorough introduction to null-hypothesis testing and statistical significance, the book then advances the arguments for and against the current interpretations and the use of significance testing in research. Siu L Chow presents a coherent challenge to contemporary criticisms of significance testing and offers a substantial and thought-provoking contribution to the debate on the proper role of statistical significance in empirical research.

Download or read book The War on Statistical Significance written by DONALD B. MACNAUGHTON and published by . This book was released on 2021-03-30 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the preface The "threshold p-value"-the arbiter of statistical significance-has been a widely used gateway to believability and acceptance for publication in scientific research since 1925. However, a growing number of statisticians and other researchers say we should "move beyond" these ideas, suggesting we should greatly reduce our emphasis on them in scientific research. These authors are waging a well-intentioned, polite, and vigorous intellectual war on the ideas of a threshold p-value and statistical significance. This is a "good" war, because it forces important issues into the open, where they can be best understood and assessed. This book grew from a sense that the threshold-p-value gateway to publication of scientific research results is highly useful but is also widely misunderstood. The book presents, from first principles, a modern view of the role of the gateway, as used by some scientific journals. The ideas are explained in terms of the recent disagreement about them between the editorial in a Special Issue on Statistical Inference of the American Statistician and a subsequent editorial in the New England Journal of Medicine. The ideas are developed with almost no reference to mathematics. (A computer can do all the standard math if the user properly understands the key ideas.) The explanations are reinforced with practical examples. The discussion shows how the concept of a threshold-p-value gateway helps researchers and journal editors maximize the overall scientific, social, and commercial benefit of scientific research. The gateway does this by optimally balancing the rates of costly "false-positive" and "false-negative" errors in a scientific journal. The book also discusses the important related ideas of a relationship between variables, a scientific hypothesis test, and the "replication crisis" in some branches of scientific research. The body of the book, which covers the key ideas, is roughly 30% of the text. The remainder consists of 23 appendices that expand the ideas in useful directions. The material is aimed at scientific researchers, journal editors, science teachers, and science students in the biological, social, and physical sciences. It will also be of interest to statisticians, data scientists, philosophers of science, and lay readers seeking an integrated modern view of the high-level operation of the study of relationships between variables in scientific research. About the author Donald B. Macnaughton has been a statistical consultant for more than 40 years. He has managed the statistical aspects of research in the fields of experimental psychology, zoology, drug dependence, nursing, education, business, geography, physical education, and inmate rehabilitation, among others. His consulting work supports and informs his main interest, which is to read, understand, and write about the vital role of the field of statistics in scientific research.

Download or read book Using and Interpreting Statistics in the Social Behavioral and Health Sciences written by William E. Wagner, III and published by SAGE Publications. This book was released on 2018-02-28 with total page 142 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Using and Interpreting Statistics in the Social, Behavioral, and Health Sciences is designed to be paired with any undergraduate introduction to research methods text used by students in a variety of disciplines. It introduces students to statistics at the conceptual level—examining the meaning of statistics, and why researchers use a particular statistical technique, rather than computational skills. Focusing on descriptive statistics, and some more advanced topics such as tests of significance, measures of association, and regression analysis, this brief, inexpensive text is the perfect companion to help students who have not yet taken an introductory statistics course or are confused by the statistics used in the articles they are reading.

Download or read book Statistical Analysis for Education and Psychology Researchers written by Ian Peers and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2006-02-27 with total page 447 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Basic statistical concepts such as probability, estimation and inference, and their role in research design and analysis are presented in this volume. The author demonstrates which statistical test to use in given circumstances and how to use it, drawing on data from psychology and education.; Written for those without a strong mathematical background, the book's examples can be worked using a pocket calculator. "Real life" data are analyzed using statistical software (SAS), output is interpreted, and a decision chart is presented which summarizes considerations when choosing a statistical test.

Download or read book Statistical Power Analysis written by Kevin R. Murphy and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2003-08-01 with total page 247 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book presents a simple and general method for conducting statistical power analysis based on the widely used F statistic. The book illustrates how these analyses work and how they can be applied to problems of studying design, to evaluate others' research, and to choose the appropriate criterion for defining "statistically significant" outcomes. Statistical Power Analysis examines the four major applications of power analysis, concentrating on how to determine: *the sample size needed to achieve desired levels of power; *the level of power that is needed in a study; *the size of effect that can be reliably detected by a study; and *sensible criteria for statistical significance. Highlights of the second edition include: a CD with an easy-to-use statistical power analysis program; a new chapter on power analysis in multi-factor ANOVA, including repeated-measures designs; and a new One-Stop PV Table to serve as a quick reference guide. The book discusses the application of power analysis to both traditional null hypothesis tests and to minimum-effect testing. It demonstrates how the same basic model applies to both types of testing and explains how some relatively simple procedures allow researchers to ask a series of important questions about their research. Drawing from the behavioral and social sciences, the authors present the material in a nontechnical way so that readers with little expertise in statistical analysis can quickly obtain the values needed to carry out the power analysis. Ideal for students and researchers of statistical and research methodology in the social, behavioral, and health sciences who want to know how to apply methods of power analysis to their research.

Download or read book The Foundations of Scientific Inference written by Wesley Salmon and published by University of Pittsburgh Pre. This book was released on 1967-09 with total page 170 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Not since Ernest Nagel’s 1939 monograph on the theory of probability has there been a comprehensive elementary survey of the philosophical problems of probablity and induction. This is an authoritative and up-to-date treatment of the subject, and yet it is relatively brief and nontechnical. Hume’s skeptical arguments regarding the justification of induction are taken as a point of departure, and a variety of traditional and contemporary ways of dealing with this problem are considered. The author then sets forth his own criteria of adequacy for interpretations of probability. Utilizing these criteria he analyzes contemporary theories of probability, as well as the older classical and subjective interpretations.

Download or read book Statistical Inference as Severe Testing written by Deborah G. Mayo and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2018-09-20 with total page 503 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Mounting failures of replication in social and biological sciences give a new urgency to critically appraising proposed reforms. This book pulls back the cover on disagreements between experts charged with restoring integrity to science. It denies two pervasive views of the role of probability in inference: to assign degrees of belief, and to control error rates in a long run. If statistical consumers are unaware of assumptions behind rival evidence reforms, they can't scrutinize the consequences that affect them (in personalized medicine, psychology, etc.). The book sets sail with a simple tool: if little has been done to rule out flaws in inferring a claim, then it has not passed a severe test. Many methods advocated by data experts do not stand up to severe scrutiny and are in tension with successful strategies for blocking or accounting for cherry picking and selective reporting. Through a series of excursions and exhibits, the philosophy and history of inductive inference come alive. Philosophical tools are put to work to solve problems about science and pseudoscience, induction and falsification.

Download or read book Understanding Inferential Statistics written by Markus Janczyk and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2023-11-25 with total page 211 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What does this p-value actually mean? And what is a significant result? This book provides a compact and comprehension-oriented introduction to inferential statistics and answers questions like these. One focus is on the logic underlying inferential statistics and hypothesis testing: Readers learn the most commonly used procedures (t-test, analysis of variance with and without repeated measures, correlation/regression) as well as the pitfalls of data analysis, and develop the understanding necessary to interpret results correctly. The individual chapters are supplemented by concrete evaluation examples from everyday research - including exemplary implementation with the programs SPSS and R. In addition to the classic methods, cross-references to current developments in psychological methodological research are also included.This book is a translation of the original German 3rd edition of Inferenzstatistik verstehen by Markus Janczyk and Roland Pfister. The translation was done with the help of artificial intelligence (machine translation by the service DeepL.com). A subsequent human revision was done primarily in terms of content, so that the book will read stylistically differently from a conventional translation.

Download or read book Understanding Statistical Analysis and Modeling written by Robert Bruhl and published by SAGE Publications. This book was released on 2017-11-15 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Understanding Statistical Analysis and Modeling is a text for graduate and advanced undergraduate students in the social, behavioral, or managerial sciences seeking to understand the logic of statistical analysis. Robert Bruhl covers all the basic methods of descriptive and inferential statistics in an accessible manner by way of asking and answering research questions. Concepts are discussed in the context of a specific research project and the book includes probability theory as the basis for understanding statistical inference. Instructions on using SPSS® are included so that readers focus on interpreting statistical analysis rather than calculations. Tables are used, rather than formulas, to describe the various calculations involved with statistical analysis and the exercises in the book are intended to encourage students to formulate and execute their own empirical investigations.

Download or read book Statistics for Political Analysis written by Theresa Marchant-Shapiro and published by CQ Press. This book was released on 2014-01-15 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Statistics are just as vital to understanding political science as the study of institutions, but getting students to understand them when teaching a methods course can be a big challenge. Statistics for Political Analysis makes understanding the numbers easy. The only introduction to statistics book written specifically for political science undergraduates, this book explains each statistical concept in plain language—from basic univariate statistics and the basic measures of association to bivariate and multivariate regression—and uses real world political examples. Students learn the relevance of statistics to political science, how to understand and calculate statistics mathematically, and how to obtain them using SPSS. All calculations are modeled step-by-step, giving students needed practice to master the process without making it intimidating. Each chapter concludes with exercises that get students actively applying the steps and building their professional skills through data calculation, analysis, and memo writing.