Research and statistical analysis help us understand how the world works, how effective medications and treatments are, what influences our health, the best approach for business practices, and much ...

In various contexts, for practical, philosophical, and logical reasons, there is a default assumption. In the criminal justice system, for example, someone is presumed innocent until proven guilty. T ...

Hypothesis testing is a formal procedure for investigating our ideas about the world using statistics. It is most often used by researchers to test predictions, called hypotheses. The first step in ...

At times we wish to examine statistical evidence, and determine whether it supports or contradicts a claim that has been made (or that we might wish to make) concerning the entire population. This is ...

If the P value is less than 5%, reject the null hypothesis; if the P value is .05 or more, don't reject the null hypothesis. Statistics textbooks -- and statisticians for that matter -- focus almost ...

Did you ever wonder why 19th century pirates are often represented wearing eye patches? I never did, because I assumed that it was for the obvious reason: they had lost an eye. Pirates, like many ...

Adam Hayes, Ph.D., CFA, is a financial writer with 15+ years Wall Street experience as a derivatives trader. Besides his extensive derivative trading expertise, Adam is an expert in economics and ...