Eiki Satake playing "Court Tennis" ("Real Tennis" in the UK)
Eiki Satake has a PhD in Applied Statistics/Mathematics Education from Teachers College, Columbia University. He is Professor of Mathematics and Statistics at Emerson College, Boston, MA.
Work profile
LindedIn profile
Constantine: Eiki, where did you grow up and what has been your trajectory so far?
Eiki: I was born in Honolulu, Hawaii, but lived there only for 3 years. After that, I lived in Osaka and Tokyo, Japan, where my parents are originally from, until I was about 14-15 years old. We all then immigrated to San Francisco. I attended a high school that specializes in mathematics and science in South San Francisco, and then went on to the University of California Berkeley, on a wrestling scholarship. I studied pure mathematics there and got my BA in Mathematics in 1979. I then became very interested in probability, especially the pedagogical aspect of teaching probability and statistics, while I was taking a couple of mathematics education courses. So, I decided to further study this and enrolled to the Applied Statistics and Mathematics/Statistics Education program at Teachers College, Columbia University. I was awarded a MS in Applied Statistics, a EdM in Mathematics Education (specialized in Psychometric Theory, aka, Educational Statistics), and a PhD in Applied Statistics/Mathematics Education.
Constantine: How did you get interested in statistics?
Eiki: As far as my initial interest, I recall that I was extremely enthusiastic about baseball statistics (batting average, slugging percentage, ERA, etc.) when I was a schoolboy in Japan. At the time, I did not really intend to become a baseball statistician but I loved the idea that I could make fairly good predictions about a player's batting average based on his past data (against which pitcher, at which ball park, the remaining number of games, and so on). Of course, I was not using any sophisticated techniques (regression, time series, discriminant analysis, and the like)—I was only 9-10 years old!
Later, when I was a doctoral student at Columbia, I started tutoring statistics/probability to a group of clinical practitioners and graduate students in Communication Disorders (the vast majority of them were Speech-Language and Audiology majors). During this time, I became quite interested in the application of probability to actual clinical practice, such as diagnoses. I also received lots of positive feedbacks and compliments about my teaching and that motivated me to follow an academic career, specifically as a teaching professor of statistics in the clinical sciences (along with research on statistics education).
Constantine: What is your job and what does your 'typical' workday involve?
Eiki: I am tenured Professor of Mathematics and Statistics at Emerson College, Boston, MA. I teach three courses per semester, namely, Introduction to Statistics (2 sections, one section targets at Marketing Communication majors, and the other targets at Communication Disorders) and Research and Statistical Methods in Communication Disorders (graduate course). I teach MWF 8:30-12:45 (back to back) every semester. Tuesdays and Thursdays are my research days along with meeting days (I serve on a couple of college-wide committees).
Constantine: You have recently become a member of TSHS. Do you consider TSHS your primary section or is it secondary?
Eiki: At this time, I enjoy both the Statistics Education and TSHS equally. It all depends on my latest research interest. Although I am one of the newest members to TSHS, I hope to be an active participant in the future.
Constantine: What is your reason for participating in TSHS?
Eiki: Over the years, many clinical and health sciences professionals have become fully aware of the importance of evidence-based practices (EBP) and of understanding relevant statistical methods. The rise of evidence-based movement has focused attention on using clinical studies for empirical evidence, along with the practitioners' subjective beliefs, to generate more sound conclusions. Unfortunately, the classical statistical methods in current use are not "evidence-based" in many ways (that includes Fisher's P-value, Neyman-Pearson's hypothesis testing, etc.). According to my experience, many professionals in the clinical and health sciences have never received proper education on EBP-oriented statistics during their training. I have conducted several short courses at the American Speech-Language Hearing Association (ASHA) conventions, delivered the keynote research presentation at the Louisiana State University School of Allied Health (entitled "Moving forward to Evidence-Based Statistics for Clinical Professionals: What really prevents us?"), and written three text books on EBP-oriented statistical methods (Research and Statistical Methods in Communication Sciences and Disorders; Handbook of Statistical Methods in Single-Subject Design; and Statistical Methods and Reasoning for Clinical Sciences: Evidence-Based Practice) to promote EBP statistical methods. To do this most effectively, I thought that TSHS would provide a great deal of all necessary information.
More specifically, EBP statistics solves some ambiguities or discrepancy, that is to say, professionals in the clinical and health sciences have long been concerned with issues referred to variously as practical significance, clinical significance, patient satisfaction, treatment efficacy, or the meaningfulness and importance of beyond hospital/clinic or real-world treatment outcomes. Unfortunately, typical biostatistics and/or research methods courses do not teach or cover these particular concepts. That is where we need some improvement. I would very much like to know how "clinical significance" is taught within the course. This piece of information truly mystifies me and need more information from TSHS.
Constantine: Do you go to JSM? If not, why not? If yes, what do you get out of it?
Eiki: I would very much like to participate and become an active participant at JSM. I have always had schedule conflicts with other national conventions. But I will be there in the future. I usually attend the regional mathematics/statistics meetings, and conduct short courses/research seminars at national/international conventions, such as the American Speech-Language Hearing Association (ASHA) once or twice a year to meet other clinical researchers who have good working knowledge of statistics in general. So, people out there, please invite me, if you wish!
Constantine: What are your thoughts about statistics in the future? About statistics education?
Eiki: As statistics educators, we need to teach both deductive inferential reasoning (from "general" to "specific," in other words, statistical inference as we usually teach in introductory/ intermediate level) and inductive inferential reasoning (from "specific" to "general," such as probabilistic or Bayesian inference). It is more clinically practical and useful throughout the course of probability and statistics. That is really important, not only promoting the students' knowledge of the subject matter, but also enriching the students' quantitative reasoning skills that can be applied to many other disciplines.
Constantine: What do you do for play? What are your interests in your free time?
Eiki: I enjoy playing North American style squash (I was regional champion in my age group several times). My lovely Irish wife Mary and I have visited several countries, including France, Japan, Spain, Ireland, Canada, and Italy. We love wine tasting and exotic/exquisite cuisines.
[This interview was conducted through emails, in November 2014. The text is based on Eiki Satake’s own words, with minimal editing by Constantine Daskalakis.]