Steve, While not new, one of my classic favorites was the now defunct Hechinger's home improvement stores advertising that 85% of their employees had an average of 15 years experience in home repairs.
Also, kudos to Ron who excercised considerable self restraint in the last sentence of his piece on odds and probability. I'll bet he was tempted to write "Both concepts are often difficult....but odds are that odds are usually harder.
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Barry Nussbaum
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency
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Original Message:
Sent: 01-08-2015 09:59
From: Timothy Armistead
Subject: Reporters and Statistics
Steve, you're probably going to get a long list of suggestions. I have two items to consider for dissemination to journalists: the importance of understanding base rate and false positive issues when reporting clinical findings, particularly those that are gleaned from large-scale studies; and the dangers of accepting at face value the many interesting but possibly misleading correlations that are derived from "big data" and reported out on what seems to be a daily basis on the 'Net and the 24-hour news cycle.
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Timothy Armistead
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Original Message:
Sent: 01-07-2015 09:57
From: Steve Pierson
Subject: Reporters and Statistics
Ron Wasserstein's recent blog entry on www.Stats.org explains the difference between odds and probability (www.stats.org/?p=1442). While the audience could be anyone, the column focuses on reporters. We'd like to have additional pieces aimed towards improving the accuracy of writing about statistical concepts.
Do you have any ideas for such a column? Have you recently seen statistical misperceptions or errors in the media? If so, please share them with me: pierson@amstat.org.
Best,
Steve
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Steve Pierson
Director of Science Policy
American Statistical Association
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