An Applet for the Investigation of Simpson's Paradox

This article describes an applet that facilitates investigation of Simpson's Paradox in the context of a number of real and hypothetical data sets. The applet builds on the Baker-Kramer graphical representation for Simpson's Paradox. The implementation and use of the applet are explained. This is followed by a description of how the applet has been used in an introductory statistics class and a discussion of student responses to the applet.

[1]  R Reintjes,et al.  Simpson's paradox: an example from hospital epidemiology. , 2000, Epidemiology.

[2]  John Bigelow,et al.  Simpson's Paradox , 2004 .

[3]  H. Wainer MINORITY CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE SAT SCORE TURNAROUND: AN EXAMPLE OF SIMPSON'S PARADOX , 1985 .

[4]  Thomas Wright,et al.  Illuminations , 2016, The Lancet.

[5]  P. Bickel,et al.  Sex Bias in Graduate Admissions: Data from Berkeley , 1975, Science.

[6]  Ivo D Dinov,et al.  SOCR: Statistics Online Computational Resource. , 2006, Journal of statistical software.

[7]  H. Wainer,et al.  Two statistical paradoxes in the interpretation of group differences: Illustrated with medical school admission and licensing data , 2004 .

[8]  J. Wakefield,et al.  Controlling for provider of treatment in the modelling of respiratory disease risk near cokeworks , 2004, Statistics in medicine.

[9]  A. Tan A Geometric Interpretation of Simpson's Paradox , 1986 .

[10]  R. Wardrop Simpson's Paradox and the Hot Hand in Basketball , 1995 .

[11]  L. Lesser REPRESENTATIONS OF REVERSAL : AN EXPLORATION OF SIMPSON ' S PARADOX 131 REPRESENTATIONS OF SIMPSON ' S PARADOX , 2006 .

[12]  Kady Schneiter Two Applets for Teaching Hypothesis Testing , 2008 .

[13]  T. R. Knapp Instances of Simpson's Paradox , 1985 .

[14]  R. Todd Ogden,et al.  Interactive Demonstrations for Statistics Education on the World Wide Web , 1998 .

[15]  M. Bar-Hillel,et al.  Magic Possibilities of the Weighted Average , 1980 .

[16]  S G Baker,et al.  Good for women, good for men, bad for people: Simpson's paradox and the importance of sex-specific analysis in observational studies. , 2001, Journal of women's health & gender-based medicine.

[17]  M. Schield SIMPSON'S PARADOX AND CORNFIELD'S CONDITIONS , 1999 .

[18]  C. Blyth On Simpson's Paradox and the Sure-Thing Principle , 1972 .

[19]  J. Terwilliger FREQUENCY OF SIMPSON'S PARADOX IN NAEP DATA , 2004 .

[20]  Clifford H. Wagner Simpson's Paradox in Real Life , 1982 .

[21]  J. French,et al.  The development of ischemic heart disease in relation to autoimmune thyroid disease in a 20-year follow-up study of an English community. , 2009, Thyroid : official journal of the American Thyroid Association.

[22]  Ian Westbrooke,et al.  Simpson's Paradox: An Example in a New Zealand Survey of Jury Composition , 1998 .

[23]  David Lindley,et al.  Introduction to the Practice of Statistics , 1990, The Mathematical Gazette.

[24]  Kady Schneiter,et al.  Combining Professional Development with Resource Development: Cooperative Design of Integrated Technology Lessons in Statistics , 2010 .

[25]  H. J. Arnold Introduction to the Practice of Statistics , 1990 .

[26]  S. Shapiro Collapsing Contingency Tables—A Geometric Approach , 1982 .

[27]  Barrie Hopson,et al.  INTRODUCTION TO PRACTICE , 1968 .

[28]  H. Wainer Visual Revelations , 2002 .

[29]  A Geometrical Interpretation of the Weighted Mean , 1984 .

[30]  G. Rücker,et al.  Simpson's paradox visualized: The example of the Rosiglitazone meta-analysis , 2008, BMC medical research methodology.

[31]  S. Julious,et al.  Confounding and Simpson's paradox , 1994, BMJ.

[32]  D. Appleton,et al.  Ignoring a Covariate: An Example of Simpson's Paradox , 1996 .

[33]  E. H. Simpson,et al.  The Interpretation of Interaction in Contingency Tables , 1951 .

[34]  S. Merhar,et al.  Letter to the editor , 2005, IEEE Communications Magazine.

[35]  Thomas L. Moore Paradoxes in Film Ratings , 2006 .

[36]  Elliott Ostler,et al.  Shodor: A National Resource for Computational Science Education , 2010 .

[37]  M. Sobel,et al.  National council of Teachers of mathematics: NCTM Officers and Directors Elected in 1979 , 1979 .

[38]  G. Yule NOTES ON THE THEORY OF ASSOCIATION OF ATTRIBUTES IN STATISTICS , 1903 .

[39]  Minja K. Paik A Graphic Representation of a Three-Way Contingency Table: Simpson's Paradox and Correlation , 1985 .

[40]  K. Kunisaki,et al.  Simpson's paradox. , 2005, Critical care medicine.