[Ads-l] p-hacking

[George Thompson]

A recent blog post used a term quite unfamiliar to me -- but, then, it
would be.  But it's not in the OED either.  It appeared in an
installment of a blog originally issued by NPR under the title
"Cornell Food Researcher's Downfall Raises Larger Questions For
Science"; the blog is called FOOD FOR THOUGHT.
September 26, 20183:07 PM ET
https://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2018/09/26/651849441/cornell-food-researchers-downfall-raises-larger-questions-for-science

"There's nothing wrong with having a lot of data and looking at it
carefully," Althouse says. "The problem is p-hacking."

To understand p-hacking, you need to understand p-values. P-values
tell you how likely it is that a result from an experiment is due to
chance or natural variations in the experiment. For example, if you go
on a diet, the p-value can estimate the chance that the weight you
lost was the result of natural background fluctuations in your weight
as opposed to because of your new diet.

P-hacking is when researchers play with data to arrive at results that
look like they're scientifically significant. For instance, they can
cherry pick data points, re-analyze the data in multiple ways or stop
an experiment early.

I suppose the expression is connected with the OED's
hack, v.3, section 1.  transitive. To make a hack of; to use in an
indiscriminate way; to make common, stale, or trite by such treatment.
At least, the phrase in the definition "use in an indiscriminate way"
seemed appropriate.

GAT

-- 
George A. Thompson
The Guy Who Still Looks Stuff Up in Books.
Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern
Univ. Pr., 1998.

But when aroused at the Trump of Doom / Ye shall start, bold kings,
from your lowly tomb. . .
L. H. Sigourney, "Burial of Mazeen", Poems.  Boston, 1827, p. 112

The Trump of Doom -- also known as The Dunghill Toadstool.  (Here's a
picture of his great-grandfather.)
http://www.parliament.uk/worksofart/artwork/james-gillray/an-excrescence---a-fungus-alias-a-toadstool-upon-a-dunghill/3851

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