Die Tücken der Statistik
Hier ein Artikel aus dem Guardian, der die Wissenschaft hinter Dokumenten und Statistiken des britischen Home office diskutiert.
Beim Guardian: Home Office research so feeble someone ought to be locked up .. ..und in Ben Goldacre badscience-Blog direkt: Is this a joke? Und darum geht es:
Luckily, the Home Office has now published a consultation paper on the subject. They defend their database by arguing that innocent people who have been arrested are as likely to commit crimes in the future as guilty people. “This,” they say, “is obviously a controversial assertion.” That’s not true: it’s a simple matter of fact, and you could easily assemble some good quality evidence to see if it’s true or not.
The Home Office has assembled some evidence. It is not good quality. In fact, this study from the Jill Dando Institute, attached to their consultation paper as an appendix, is possibly the most unclear and poorly presented piece of research I have ever seen in a professional environment. Or am I having a bad day? Join me in my struggle to understand their work.
