Applied Statistics Commons^™

Flesch-Kincaid Reading Grade Level Re-Examined: Creating A Uniform Method For Calculating Readability On A Certification Exam, Emily Neuhoff, Kristiana M. Feeser, Kayla Sutherland, Thomas Hovatter

Online Journal for Workforce Education and Development

Abstract

Objective: This study attempted to establish a consistent measurement technique of the readability of a state-wide Certified Nursing Assistant’s (CNA) certification exam. Background: Monitoring the readability level of an exam helps ensure all test versions do not exceed the maximum reading level of the exam, and that knowledge of the subject matter, rather than reading ability, is being assessed. Method: A two part approach was used to specify and evaluate readability. First, two methods (Microsoft Word^® (MSW) software and published readability formulae) were used to calculate Flesch Reading Ease (FRE) and Flesch-Kincaid Reading Grade Level (FKRGL) for multiple …

The Reliability Of Crowdsourcing: Latent Trait Modeling With Mechanical Turk, Matt Baucum, Steven Rouse Dr., Cindy Miller-Perrin, Elizabeth Mancuso Dr.

Seaver College Research And Scholarly Achievement Symposium

Mechanical Turk, an online crowdsourcing platform, has recently received increased attention in the social sciences as studies continue to suggest its viability as a source for reliable experimental data. Given the ease with which large samples can be quickly and inexpensively gathered, it is worth examining whether Mechanical Turk can provide accurate experimental data for methodologies requiring such large samples. One such methodology is Item Response Theory, a psychometric paradigm that defines test items by a mathematical relationship between a respondent’s ability and the probability of item endorsement. To test whether Mechanical Turk can serve as a reliable source of …

Spatiotemporal Meta-Analysis: Reviewing Health Psychology Phenomena Over Space And Time., Blair T. Johnson

CHIP Documents

This supplemental material is meant to support this article:

Johnson, B. T., Crowley, E., & Marrouch, N. Spatiotemporal meta-analysis: Reviewing health psychology phenomena over space and time. Health Psychology Review.

Specifically, it is a database of GDPs per capita for nations in the world between 1800 and 2015. It is archived here to support an online supplement to this article.

GDP per capita

Structural Properties Of Transmuted Weibull Distribution, Kaisar Ahmad, S. P. Ahmad, A. Ahmed

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

The transmuted Weibull distribution, and a related special case, is introduced. Estimates of parameters are obtained by using a new method of moments.

New Entropy Estimators With Smaller Root Mean Squared Error, Amer Ibrahim Al-Omari

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

New estimators of entropy of continuous random variable are suggested. The proposed estimators are investigated under simple random sampling (SRS), ranked set sampling (RSS), and double ranked set sampling (DRSS) methods. The estimators are compared with Vasicek (1976) and Al-Omari (2014) entropy estimators theoretically and by simulation in terms of the root mean squared error (RMSE) and bias values. The results indicate that the suggested estimators have less RMSE and bias values than their competing estimators introduced by Vasicek (1976) and Al-Omari (2014).

An Empirical Study On Different Ranking Methods For Effective Data Classification, Ilangovan Sangaiah, A. Vincent Antony Kumar, Appavu Balamurugan

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

Ranking is the attribute selection technique used in the pre-processing phase to emphasize the most relevant attributes which allow models of classification simpler and easy to understand. It is a very important and a central task for information retrieval, such as web search engines, recommendation systems, and advertisement systems. A comparison between eight ranking methods was conducted. Ten different learning algorithms (NaiveBayes, J48, SMO, JRIP, Decision table, RandomForest, Multilayerperceptron, Kstar) were used to test the accuracy. The ranking methods with different supervised learning algorithms give different results for balanced accuracy. It was shown the selection of ranking methods could be …

Caution For Software Use Of New Statistical Methods (R), Akiva J. Lorenz, Barry S. Markman, Shlomo Sawilowsky

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

Open source programming languages such as R allow statisticians to develop and rapidly disseminate advanced procedures, but sometimes at the expense of a proper vetting process. A new example is the least trimmed squares regression available in R’s lqs() in the MASS library. It produces pretty regression lines, particularly in the presence of outliers. However, this procedure lacks a defined standard error, and thus it should be avoided.

Inferences About The Skipped Correlation Coefficient: Dealing With Heteroscedasticity And Non-Normality, Rand Wilcox

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

A common goal is testing the hypothesis that Pearson’s correlation is zero and typically this is done based on Student’s T test. There are, however, several well-known concerns. First, Student’s T is sensitive to heteroscedasticity. That is, when it rejects, it is reasonable to conclude that there is dependence, but in terms of making a decision about the strength of the association, it is unsatisfactory. Second, Pearson’s correlation is not robust: it can poorly reflect the strength of the association. Even a single outlier can have a tremendous impact on the usual estimate of Pearson’s correlation, which can result in …

Front Matter, Jmasm Editors

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

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Jmasm34: Two Group Program For Cohen's D, Hedges’ G, Η2, Radj2, Ω2, Ɛ2, Confidence Intervals, And Power, David A. Walker

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

The purpose of this research is to provide an application for users interested in a SPSS syntax program to determine an array of commonly-employed effect sizes and confidence intervals not readily available in SPSS functionality, such as the standardized mean difference and r-related squared indices, for a between-group design.

Monte Carlo Comparison Of The Parameter Estimation Methods For The Two-Parameter Gumbel Distribution, Demet Aydin, Birdal Şenoğlu

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

The performances of the seven different parameter estimation methods for the Gumbel distribution are compared with numerical simulations. Estimation methods used in this study are the method of moments (ME), the method of maximum likelihood (ML), the method of modified maximum likelihood (MML), the method of least squares (LS), the method of weighted least squares (WLS), the method of percentile (PE) and the method of probability weighted moments (PWM). Performance of the estimators is compared with respect to their biases, MSE and deficiency (Def) values via Monte-Carlo simulation. A Monte Carlo Simulation study showed that the method of PWM was …

Contrails: Causal Inference Using Propensity Scores, Dean S. Barron

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

Contrails are clouds caused by airplane exhausts, which geologists contend decrease daily temperature ranges on Earth. Following the 2001 World Trade Center attack, cancelled domestic flights triggered the first absence of contrails in decades. Resultant exceptional data capacitated causal inference analysis by propensity score matching. Estimated contrail effect was 6.8981°F.

Two Stage Robust Ridge Method In A Linear Regression Model, Adewale Folaranmi Lukman, Oyedeji Isola Osowole, Kayode Ayinde

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

Two Stage Robust Ridge Estimators based on robust estimators M, MM, S, LTS are examined in the presence of autocorrelation, multicollinearity and outliers as alternative to Ordinary Least Square Estimator (OLS). The estimator based on S estimator performs better. Mean square error was used as a criterion for examining the performances of these estimators.

The Bayes Factor For Case-Control Studies With Misclassified Data, Tzesan Lee

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

The question of how to test if collected data for a case-control study are misclassified was investigated. A mixed approach was employed to calculate the Bayes factor to assess the validity of the null hypothesis of no-misclassification. A real-world data set on the association between lung cancer and smoking status was used as an example to illustrate the proposed method.

Resolving The Issue Of How Reliability Is Related To Statistical Power: Adhering To Mathematical Definitions, Donald W. Zimmerman, Bruno D. Zumbo

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

Reliability in classical test theory is a population-dependent concept, defined as a ratio of true-score variance and observed-score variance, where observed-score variance is a sum of true and error components. On the other hand, the power of a statistical significance test is a function of the total variance, irrespective of its decomposition into true and error components. For that reason, the reliability of a dependent variable is a function of the ratio of true-score variance and observed-score variance, whereas statistical power is a function of the sum of the same two variances. Controversies about how reliability is related to statistical …

In (Partial) Defense Of .05, Thomas R. Knapp

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

Researchers are frequently chided for choosing the .05 alpha level as the determiner of statistical significance (or non-significance). A partial justification is provided.

Vol. 14, No. 2 (Full Issue), Jmasm Editors

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

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Semi-Parametric Non-Proportional Hazard Model With Time Varying Covariate, Kazeem A. Adeleke, Alfred A. Abiodun, R. A. Ipinyomi

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

The application of survival analysis has extended the importance of statistical methods for time to event data that incorporate time dependent covariates. The Cox proportional hazards model is one such method that is widely used. An extension of the Cox model with time-dependent covariates was adopted when proportionality assumption are violated. The purpose of this study is to validate the model assumption when hazard rate varies with time. This approach is applied to model data on duration of infertility subject to time varying covariate. Validity is assessed by a set of simulation experiments and results indicate that a non proportional …

Bayesian Analysis Under Progressively Censored Rayleigh Data, Gyan Prakash

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

The one-parameter Rayleigh model is considered as an underlying model for evaluating the properties of Bayes estimator under Progressive Type-II right censored data. The One‑Sample Bayes prediction bound length (OSBPBL) is also measured. Based on two different asymmetric loss functions a comparative study presented for Bayes estimation. A simulation study was used to evaluate their comparative properties.

Statistical Modeling Of Migration Attractiveness Of The Eu Member States, Tatiana Tikhomirova, Yulia Lebedeva

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

Identifying the relationship between the migration attractiveness of the European Union countries and their level of socio-economic development is investigated. An approach is proposed identify influences on migration socio-economic characteristics, by aggregating and reducing their diversity, and substantiating the cause-and-effect relationships of the studied phenomenon. A stable classification of countries scheme is developed according to the attractiveness of migration on aggregate factors, and then an econometric model of a binary choice using panel data for 2008-2010 was applying, quantifying the impact of aggregate designed factors on immigration and emigration.

The Distribution Of The Inverse Square Root Transformed Error Component Of The Multiplicative Time Series Model, Bright F. Ajibade, Chinwe R. Nwosu, J. I. Mbegdu

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

The probability density function, mean and variance of the inverse square-root transformed left-truncated N(1,σ²) error component e^*_t(=1/ √e_t) of the multiplicative time series model were established. A comparison of key-statistical properties of e^*_t and e_t confirmed normality with mean 1 but with Var(e^*_t) ≈1/4Var(e_t) when σ≤0.14. Hence σ≤0.14 is the required condition for successful transformation.

Approaches For Detection Of Unstable Processes: A Comparative Study, Yerriswamy Wooluru, D. R. Swamy, P. Nagesh

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

A process is stable only when parameters of the distribution of a process or product characteristic remain same over time. Only a stable process has the ability to perform in a predictable manner over time. Statistical analysis of process data usually assume that data are obtained from stable process. In the absence of control charts, the hypothesis of process stability is usually assessed by visual examination of the pattern in the run chart. In this paper appropriate statistical approaches have been adopted to detect instability in the process and compared their performance with the run chart of considerably shorter length …

A Robust Panel Unit Root Test In The Presence Of Cross Sectional Dependence, Nurul Sima Mohamad Shariff, Nor Aishah Hamzah

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

Problems arise in testing the stationarity of the panel in the presence of cross sectional dependence and outliers. The currently available panel unit root tests are very much affected by the presence of outliers. As such, this article introduces an alternative test which is robust to outliers and cross sectional dependence. The performance and robustness of the proposed test is discussed and comparisons are made to the existing tests via simulation studies.

Review Of Developing Quantitative Literacy Skills In History And The Social Sciences: A Web-Based Common Core Approach By Kathleen W. Craver, Victor J. Ricchezza, H L. Vacher

Numeracy

Kathleen W. Craver. Developing Quantitative Literacy Skills in History and Social Sciences: A Web-Based Common Core Standards Approach (Lantham MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc., 2014). 191 pp.
ISBN 978-1-4758-1050-9 (cloth); ISBN …-1051-6 (pbk); ISBN…-1052-3 (electronic).

This book could be a breakthrough for teachers in the trenches who are interested in or need to know about quantitative literacy (QL). It is a resource providing 85 topical pieces, averaging 1.5 pages, in which a featured Web site is presented, described, and accompanied by 2-4 critical-thinking questions purposefully drawing on data from the Web site. The featured Web sites range from …

Binocular 3d Motion Perception As Bayesian Inference, Martin Lages, Suzanne Heron

MODVIS Workshop

The human visual system encodes monocular motion and binocular disparity input before it is integrated into a single 3D percept. Here we propose a geometric-statistical model of human 3D motion perception that solves the aperture problem in 3D by assuming that (i) velocity constraints arise from inverse projection of local 2D velocity constraints in a binocular viewing geometry, (ii) noise from monocular motion and binocular disparity processing is independent, and (iii) slower motions are more likely to occur than faster ones. In two experiments we found that instantiation of this Bayesian model can explain perceived 3D line motion direction under …

Applying Penalized Binary Logistic Regression With Correlation Based Elastic Net For Variables Selection, Zakariya Yahya Algamal, Muhammad Hisyam Lee

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

Reduction of the high dimensional classification using penalized logistic regression is one of the challenges in applying binary logistic regression. The applied penalized method, correlation based elastic penalty (CBEP), was used to overcome the limitation of LASSO and elastic net in variable selection when there are perfect correlation among explanatory variables. The performance of the CBEP was demonstrated through its application in analyzing two well-known high dimensional binary classification data sets. The CBEP provided superior classification performance and variable selection compared with other existing penalized methods. It is a reliable penalized method in binary logistic regression.

Spss Programs For Addressing Two Forms Of Power For Multiple Regression Coefficients, Christopher Aberson

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

This paper presents power analysis tools for multiple regression. The first takes input of correlations between variables and sample size and outputs power for multiple predictors. The second addresses power to detect significant effects for all of the predictors in the model. Both employ user-friendly SPSS Custom Dialogs.

Are Per-Family Type I Error Rates Relevant In Social And Behavioral Science?, Andrew V. Frane

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

The familywise Type I error rate is a familiar concept in hypothesis testing, whereas the per‑family Type I error rate is rarely addressed. This article uses Monte Carlo simulations and graphics to make a case for the relevance of the per‑family Type I error rate in research practice and pedagogy.

Per Family Error Rates: A Response, James F. Troendle, Keshia-Lee Martin, Vance W. Berger

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

As the authors note, the familywise error rate (FWER) is used rather often, whereas the per-family error rate (PFER) is not. Is this as it should be? It would seem that no universal answer is possible, as context determines which is more appropriate in any given application. In the general scenario of testing the benefit of an intervention, one might ideally want an error rate that aligns with the decision for benefit. In most cases the FWER does this pretty well, while allowing one to identify those endpoints for which benefit exists. The PFER does not seem to have any …

Maximum Likelihood Estimation Of The Kumaraswamy Exponential Distribution With Applications, K. A. Adepoju, O. I. Chukwu

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

The Kumaraswamy exponential distribution, a generalization of the exponential, is developed as a model for problems in environmental studies, survival analysis and reliability. The estimation of parameters is approached by maximum likelihood and the observed information matrix is derived. The proposed models are applied to three real data sets.