Essay on Proceed With Caution: The Danger of Interpreting Statistics

Statistics provides us with very useful tools and techniques that aide us in dealing with real world scenarios. I have been able to learn several useful concepts by studying statistics that can aide me in making rational and informed decisions that are supported by the analysis results. Statistics as a discipline is the application and development of various processes put in place to gather, interpret, and analyse the information. The quantification of biological, social, and scientific phenomenons, design and analysis of experiments and surveys, and application of

In 1980 China introduced the one-child policy to save it from a famine. In 1980 China had a fertility rate of 2.7 children per women that lived in China. Document B states, “The claim by Chinese officials that the one child policy has helped avert 400 million births simply cannot be substantiated by facts.” The fertility rate means the number of children a women has in her lifetime. Since 1980, China's one child policy is helping

• Provide at least two examples or problem situations in which statistics was used or could be used.

With more than 1.3 billion people, China has to think about a solution and find ways to deal with its population explosion. In order to have control over population, in 1970, a policy named China’s One Child Policy was introduced. Mingliang argues that, “China, through the one-child policy, has instituted the most aggressive, comprehensive population policy in the world” (1). This policy limits all families in the Republic of China to have only one child, regardless of the sex: however, within this policy there are some exceptions. It is possible to have two children only if the first child is born with a disability, if parents work in a high risk job, if the couple lives in villages, or if the family is a non- Han, otherwise you are

The one-child policy was implemented in 1979 by the Chinese government (The Economist 3). Its original goal was to restrain the population growth from its expected goal of 1.4 billion to a maximum of 1.2 billion by the end of the century (Kane and Choi 992). The policy was created with little regard to the potential demographic or societal changes, but rather was a political and economic measure to control the abnormally high population growth (Feng et al. 84). China’s population was rapidly growing, but there was a severe shortage of natural

To view the research on a nominal scale, the research data can be drawn from the type of class. The word nominal is derived from the root word in Latin for name (Usable Stats, 2013). The name of the class, Psychological Statistics, is the nominal measurement for this research. When conducting this study, the study will only be measured during the course of this specific class. The results could drastically change when considering another type of class such as Quantitative Literacy as the cognitive understanding of such a collegic math class may be more optimal through a different course-delivery format.

the audience, and it is hard to put it to perspective. Therefore, a statistic is appealing to the

The information in the table below refers to the 2008 model year product line of BMW automobiles. Identify the Individuals, variables, and data corresponding to the variables in the table below. Determine whether each variable is qualitative, continuous, or, discrete. Please refer to problems #51 and #53 on page 13 for examples.

When we look around us, we may not recognize that statistics is all around. Before I began to take this course “Statistics for Managers” I was not aware of how statistics actually worked. The first idea that came to my mind about statistics was probability. Not knowing statistics and probability are related because they both determine a possible outcome. Throughout this course I have learned what statistics is and how it works. In this paper, I will describe descriptive and inferential statistics, hypothesis developing and testing, the selection of statistical tests, and how to evaluate statistical results in analyzing data.

The article does well provide details to support main point of the author argument. In fact, the usage of statistics and other people stories may reinforced the credibility of this article. Furthermore, because of the usage of clear language and key terms that were fine defined aids the readers in understanding the message of the text. The only downfall of the article is some of statistics is not well supported with evidence or a guidelines guiding us back the origins of these statistics, although the paper is not flawless, the overall strong point of it defeats it

1a. China and Japan are both industrialized countries where population is decreasing; however, they are both decreasing due to different social, economic, or political factors. With 1.33 billion people, China has been one of the world’s most populous countries, however due to the overpopulation crisis; it caused implications and strain upon the country’s energy and resources. This called for the government attention to fix the issue of overpopulation by developing the “one-child policy” which limits couples to having only one child each. The overall outcome of the policy was to reduce population growth, increase economic growth, limit poverty, and to create better health for the citizens of China. Governments

In his 2013 book, Naked Statistics, Charles Wheelan explains a field that is commonly seen, commonly applied, and commonly misinterpreted: statistics. Though statistical data is ubiquitous in daily life, valid statistical conclusions are not. Wheelan reveals that when data analysis is flawed or incomplete, faulty conclusions abound. Wheelan’s work uncovers statistics’ unscrupulous potential, but also makes a key distinction between deliberate misuse and careless misreading. However, his analysis is less successful in distinguishing common sense from poor judgement, a gap that enables the very statistical issues he describes to perpetuate themselves.

In How to Lie with Statistics (Huff, 1954), Darrel Huff deciphers statistical examples and explains the means of deception that statistics and statisticians sometimes use to relay false information. Huff also conveys an underlying message of don’t believe everything you’re told, something him and my mother have in common. At first glance, a reader might think that this book will teach people how to actually lie using statistics, but that is not the case. It gives the reader a glimpse or a behind the curtain view of how easily it is to be deceived using numbers and how it is slyly achieved. Ironically he calls the book How to Lie with Statistics almost to tease his audience that the content in this book is not as it appears. To my utmost surprise, I actually rather enjoyed this book. It was a fairly simple read that was filled with new information and showed me how to look closer at statistical figures in the future. The humor was spot on so much, so that I even chuckled aloud occasionally. For the icing on the cake, I even expanded my vocabulary to learn fun words such as rotogravure.

In the article Overpopulation Is Still the Problem, Alon Tal (2013) claims that overpopulation remains the number one problem facing the world today and discusses various problems and possible solutions. Tal unveils the falsely assuring news stories refuting overpopulation as a problem. He particularly dissects Ellis Erle’s assertions, in the New York Times, concerning China’s seemingly magical works of technology. Erle comes to the conclusion that China’s amazing technology has and will always be able to keep them out of any problems regarding overpopulation. Of course Tal is able to rhythmically rebut Erle’s claims by explaining that, “Anyone with a teaspoon of historic sensibilities about the country 's environmental history might want to mention its long litany of famines which occurred precisely because carrying capacities were consistently outstripped by a growing population”. Tal then goes on to explain other problems linked directly to overpopulation in China like the food crisis from 1958-1961 which led to the starvation of over 20 million people. He also discusses the Chinese one-child policy describing it as “tough medicine” although the application of the policy was flawed he depicts how it has prevented the next round of famines. Tal ties the China population problems into the rest of the article which is mainly about how quickly the world is growing and what we need to do about it. He presents distressing facts like 1 in 8 people in the world suffer from

How much do we really know about our country, our district, or even our hometown? Are statistics really what people think? According to Alan Smith, an inaugural recipient of the Royal Statistical Society's Award for Excellence in Official Statistics, what people think is always extremely different than what the real statistic truly is. In his Ted Talk, entitled “Why We Should Love Statistics”, he discusses his study of statistics which opened up a whole new vision of the subject for me. Before watching this Ted Talk, statistics was simply a more relatable math class. After watching, I see now that statistics is also a method to connect people within communities. In fact, while statistics is a field that involves entirely numbers, it should