Public Perception of Statistics

I was wondering what the perception of statistics in this forum is, and in the countries inhabited by tropers. Here (Australia) it seems like most people underestimate the importance of statistics and have little knowledge of how they are produced, even though good statistics are one of the most important factors in good policy decisions.

I am particularly interested in the USA (where I understand the Census Bureau is not held in high regard), Britain (whose agency has been guilty of number-fudging in the recent past) and Canada (I believe their chief statistician resigned in protest over the decision to make the census a sample)

How to Lie With Statistics—"Over half a million copies sold!" Seriously, it's way too easy to frame a study in such a way that the numbers are more convincing than they really should be. Always keep in mind who's providing funding.

Pretty much. Statistics can be a strong indication, but even outright number fudging aside it's stupid easy to bias your selection, deliberate or not.

edited 16th Mar '11 3:45:36 PM by Pykrete

Pretty much, which is why a well-funded, well-staffed independent statistical body is so important. Also, education; I'm always surprised how many people don't realise that the figures released by the A Ustralian Bureau of Statistics are estimates :P

edited 16th Mar '11 3:50:26 PM by Kyelin

Public perception and actual statistics are never the same. More so, the manner in which statistics are gathered can already make them flawed and biased to a greater extent than human error normally allows. Plus, everyone knows that the public only cares about what the politicians are talking about.

Also makes it so much easier to win debates when you can pull evidence out instead of sourceless data from you butt.

Well in that sort of case I'd like to think that the statistics would then change public perception. Of course, the key words there are "like to"...

The aim when designing a survey should be to reduce bias as much as possible... this is why statistical agencies have whole teams of people whose only task is to phrase the questions properly to get the right (read: true) answers

Yeah, but then you get things like "Men think of sex every seven seconds" or some bullshit, unfounded, proven untrue, but it takes off anyway.

Yeah, but that's not exclusive to statistics; ideas (such as statistics, rumours or urban legends) spread if they're interesting even if they're thoroughly untrue.

I doubt you can really blame the field of statistics for that, any more than you can blame "being cold gives you the cold" on immunology :P

Since you ask, in the US there's a concerted effort to make facts irrelevant. That includes statistics, which can be skewed (as someone pointed out) in the collection, in the analysis, or even in the reporting. Fox News, for instance, reported on a poll about the collective bargaining situation in Wisconsin. The majority supported public employees and their unions, so Fox simply switched the numbers to fit their ideology.

One real problem is that the media simply report the numbers, the bottom line, of a survey or study. They don't look at the methodology or the potential bias of the researcher. The audience accepts the conclusions that reinforce their beliefs and ignores the ones that don't.

Another problem is that politicians use anecdotal evidence to "prove" one thing when the opposite is much more likely. For instance, when they made the bankruptcy laws tougher, they talked about deadbeats buying things they couldn't afford. The truth is that most people go bankrupt because of medical bills.

For Canada we let politicians run their mouth and make any number they want in terms of budget costs, economic projections and whatnot. Then after they say it, Statistics Canada and other agencies dedicated solely to coming up with numbers and nothing else, put out their number which invariably conflicts with the government. Then we get angry.

[ignorable rant below]

As for the resignation thing, unfortunately, the Canadian public didn't get as angry as I thought they might over the census issue. The tories basically nuked the census, causing a vast number of vital statistics for policy making to be destroyed, and they lied about Statistics Canada supporting this. In order to prove they did not support it, the head of Stat Can resigned so that he could speak out as a citizen against the government over the decision. At this point, the census is a piece of dogshit because of the tories and I'm worried about the future of the country.

edited 17th Mar '11 9:39:44 AM by breadloaf

Cheers; that's the impression I got from watching American news (read: the Daily Show ) and reading these fora, but obviously since I don't live in the USA I wasn't sure if it was really true..

Seriously? His resignation didn't help? Wow, that's bad. Screwing over the census doesn't just screw over the census data, but all other surveys that rely on that data.... is it malice or stupidity, do you think? (or both, I guess)