In my university course on Psychological Assessment, I recently explained the different quality criteria of a test used for dichotomous decisions (yes/no, positive/negative, healthy/sick, …). A quite popular example in textbooks is the case of cancer screenings, where an untrained reader might be surprised by the low predictive value of a test. I created a […]
Author: neurotroph
Serengeti Park
Today, I don’t have cherry blossoms for you. Just some animals from the Serengeti Park. You can find higher resolutions at my 500px profile.
Vagrant VM for starting a Rails project
This is something off-topic for this blog, but after spending several hours setting up an environment for developing and testing a Ruby on Rails project, I’d like to share my solution. I recently had an idea for a small web-project, for that I’d like to use Ruby on Rails. From previous attempts of using Rails, […]
“Statistics is in a mess.”
The Valley of Shit
Having only started my PhD studies a few months ago, I am still eager and highly motivated to finish what I have just started. However, first doubts on the topic and the quality of my work already came (and went again, luckily), so I could relate to this post on the Valley of Shit: The […]
Replicability, Data Quality and Bayesian Methods
On the About page I wrote, that I blog about things I come across while researching for my PhD. So, you may very well ask what this PhD is supposed to be about. For the interested reader — researchers and the uninitiated alike —, here is some overview on my current plans and research focus.
ASA statement on p-Values: Improving valid statistical reasoning
A lot of debate (and part of my thesis) revolve around replicability and the proper use of inferential methods. The American Statistical Association has now published a statement on the use and the interpretation of p-Values (freely available, yay). It includes six principles and how to handle p-Values. None of them are new in a theoretical […]
Scientific Hoaxes and Bad Academic Writing
A new case of scientific hoax, that happened six years ago, is currently circulating: Six years ago I submitted a paper for a panel, “On the Absence of Absences” that was to be part of an academic conference later that year—in August 2010. Then, and now, I had no idea what the phrase “absence of […]
Mixing up Standard Errors and Standard Deviations
Over at the Non Significance blog, the author describes the case of a paper that has some strange descriptive statistics: What surprised me were the tiny standard deviations for some of the Variable 1 and 2, especially in combination with the range given. In the blog post, the author outlines his approach to make sense […]
Birth Rates and Life Expectancy
Bad enough, that we have to read und hear current failures of thought by right wing populists (article in German only) and many relativizations (comments in German only). It seems like 70 years of History class did not help to stop utter racism in public debate. What, however, sparked my interest was the question what correlations […]