The Interpretation of Scholars' Interpretations of Confidence Intervals: Criticism, Replication, and Extension of Hoekstra et al. (2014).

ABSTRACT: Hoekstra et al. (Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 2014, 21:1157-1164) surveyed the interpretation of confidence intervals (CIs) by first-year students, master students, and researchers with six items expressing misinterpretations of CIs. They asked respondents to answer all items, computed the number of items endorsed, and concluded that misinterpretation of CIs is robust across groups. Their design may have produced this outcome artifactually for reasons that we describe. This paper discusses first the two interpretations of CIs and, hence, why misinterpretation cannot be inferred from endorsement of some of the items. Next, a re-analysis of Hoekstra et al.'s data reveals some puzzling differences between first-year and master students that demand further investigation. For that purpose, we

SUBMITTER: Garcia-Perez MA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4937803 | biostudies-literature | 2016

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature