Survey Methodology and the Future of West Ham United
West Ham United, the English football (soccer) club I support, hasn’t seen much recent success. The fans, in a fine example of optimism bias, expect the team to win while playing with a certain élan....
View ArticleCanada’s Top Brands
Like a doughnut the survey in Canadian Business magazine that placed Tim Hortons as Canada’s Top Brand is enjoyable but not necessarily the most nutritious thing in the world. We find out that...
View ArticleEvaluating Evaluations of Evaluations
Stark and Freishat (2014) are pretty negative about student evaluations of teaching. Many of their criticisms, however, seem to be about the general problems of surveys while other criticisms seem to...
View ArticleIs Reliability A Good Thing?
Reliability in analysis is widely valued. Reliability being returning the same result whenever we test the same thing. I’m not against reliability but it can be overrated as J. Scott Armstrong...
View ArticleLying With Statistics
While statistics can help us understand the world there is plenty of opportunity to abuse them to mislead. Darrell Huff wrote a short book that was first published in 1952 on lying with statistics....
View ArticleField Guide to Lies
Daniel Levin has an very enjoyable and informative popular science book in his Field Guide to Lies. He surveys how we know what we know, and how we communicate it to others. To be fair not all of it is...
View ArticleWhat caused the classic polling disaster?
The Literary Digest’s prediction that Republican Alf Landon would beat the incumbent Democratic president Franklin Delano Roosevelt in a landslide in 1936 rates as arguably the biggest disaster of...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Survey Methodology And The Future Of West Ham United
West Ham United, the English football (soccer) club I support, hasn’t seen much recent success. (Written in 2014, as I revise this in 2021 things are better). The fans, in a fine example of optimism...
View ArticleCanada’s Top Brands
Like a doughnut the survey in Canadian Business magazine that placed Tim Hortons as Canada’s Top Brand is enjoyable but not necessarily the most nutritious thing in the world. We find out that...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Evaluating Evaluations Of Evaluations
Stark and Freishat (2014) are pretty negative about student evaluations of teaching. To be fair the more you study evaluations the more problems you see. I agree that we have a problem with bias in...
View ArticleClik here to view.
Is Reliability A Good Thing?
Reliability in analysis is widely valued. Reliability is returning the same result whenever we test the same thing. I’m not against reliability. Still, it can be overrated as Scott Armstrong explains....
View ArticleClik here to view.
Lying With Statistics
While statistics can help us understand the world there is plenty of opportunity to abuse them to mislead. Darrell Huff wrote a short book that was first published in 1952 on lying with statistics....
View ArticleClik here to view.
Field Guide to Lies
Daniel Levitin has an very enjoyable and informative popular science book in his Field Guide to Lies. He surveys how we know what we know, and how we communicate it to others. To be fair not all of it...
View ArticleClik here to view.
What Caused The Classic Polling Disaster?
1936, The Worst Ever Polling Disaster? In 1936 The Literary Digest made a prediction that Republican Alf Landon would beat the incumbent Democratic president Franklin Delano Roosevelt in a landslide....
View ArticleClik here to view.
Ideology, Persuasion, And Going Green
A major challenge is persuading members of the public with very different worldviews to take actions aimed at the common good, such as recycling. An appeal that works for a conservative might not work...
View Article
