The Earth Is Round (p < .05) Export

@article{citeulike:2643653, abstract = {After 4 decades of severe criticism, the ritual of null hypothesis significance testing—mechanical dichotomous decisions around a sacred .05 criterion—still persists. This article reviews the problems with this practice, including its near-universal misinterpretation of p as the probability that H\_0 is false, the misinterpretation that its complement is the probability of successful replication, and the mistaken assumption that if one rejects H\_0 one thereby affirms the theory that led to the test. Exploratory data analysis and the use of graphic methods, a steady improvement in and a movement toward standardization in measurement, an emphasis on estimating effect sizes using confidence intervals, and the informed use of available statistical methods is suggested. For generalization, psychologists must finally rely, as has been done in all the older sciences, on replication.}, author = {Cohen, Jacob}, citeulike-article-id = {2643653}, citeulike-linkout-0 = {http://web.math.umt.edu/wilson/Math444/Handouts/Cohen94_earth%20is%20round.pdf}, comment = {There are some piercing examples here that make it very clear why p-values are most definitely not the same as the probability that the null hypothesis is true and why our intuition sometimes leads us astray. }, journal = {American Psychologist}, keywords = {criticism, hypothesis\_testing, p\_values, statistics}, month = {December}, number = {12}, pages = {997--1003}, posted-at = {2008-04-09 06:25:57}, priority = {0}, title = {The Earth Is Round (p < .05)}, url = {http://web.math.umt.edu/wilson/Math444/Handouts/Cohen94_earth%20is%20round.pdf}, volume = {49}, year = {1994} }

TY - JOUR ID - citeulike:2643653 L3 - citeulike-article-id:2643653 N2 - After 4 decades of severe criticism, the ritual of null hypothesis significance testing—mechanical dichotomous decisions around a sacred .05 criterion—still persists. This article reviews the problems with this practice, including its near-universal misinterpretation of p as the probability that H_0 is false, the misinterpretation that its complement is the probability of successful replication, and the mistaken assumption that if one rejects H_0 one thereby affirms the theory that led to the test. Exploratory data analysis and the use of graphic methods, a steady improvement in and a movement toward standardization in measurement, an emphasis on estimating effect sizes using confidence intervals, and the informed use of available statistical methods is suggested. For generalization, psychologists must finally rely, as has been done in all the older sciences, on replication. IS - 12 JF - American Psychologist EP - 1003 TI - The Earth Is Round (p < .05) VL - 49 SP - 997 KW - criticism KW - hypothesis_testing KW - p_values KW - statistics N1 - There are some piercing examples here that make it very clear why p-values are most definitely not the same as the probability that the null hypothesis is true and why our intuition sometimes leads us astray. AU - Cohen, Jacob PY - 1994/12// UR - http://web.math.umt.edu/wilson/Math444/Handouts/Cohen94_earth%20is%20round.pdf ER -