{"id":1363,"date":"2013-11-22T16:10:47","date_gmt":"2013-11-22T16:10:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/copyright.lboro.ac.uk\/teachingandlearning\/?p=1363"},"modified":"2013-11-22T16:10:47","modified_gmt":"2013-11-22T16:10:47","slug":"twenty-tips-for-interpreting-scientific-claims","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/teaching-learning\/2013\/11\/22\/twenty-tips-for-interpreting-scientific-claims\/","title":{"rendered":"Twenty tips for interpreting scientific claims"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/teachingandlearning2\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/13\/2013\/11\/nature1.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-1364\" alt=\"Nature journal logo\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/teachingandlearning2\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/13\/2013\/11\/nature1.png\" width=\"184\" height=\"76\" \/><\/a>The journal Nature has this week published an <a title=\"comment piece link\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/polopoly_fs\/1.14183!\/menu\/main\/topColumns\/topLeftColumn\/pdf\/503335a.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">interesting comment piece <\/a>aimed specifically at educating politicians about the scientific approach to data but which could just as easily be used for many different types of data.\u00a0 The \u201ctwenty tips\u201d are as useful in helping us remember how to judge educational data and to avoid simple conclusions to complex issues.<\/p>\n<p>Of the twenty tips worth thinking about with regard to education, I highlight the following:<\/p>\n<p>Differences and chance cause variation \u2013\u00a0 when students sit their assessments makes a difference, remember the hayfever season!<\/p>\n<p>No measurement is exact \u2013 as the article says, \u201cpractically all measurements have some errors. If the measurement process were repeated, one might record a different result\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Bias is rife \u2013 think about what assessments (for example) you are setting and for whom. How will this affect the outcomes?<\/p>\n<p>Extrapolating beyond the data is risky \u2013 how many times have we read that a whole area of the curriculum\/cohort of students is view in the same way?<\/p>\n<p>Scientists are human \u2013 they have vested interests in promoting a specific position \u2013 also applies to academics, managers, probably everyone!<\/p>\n<p><a title=\"Nature comment piece\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nature.com\/polopoly_fs\/1.14183!\/menu\/main\/topColumns\/topLeftColumn\/pdf\/503335a.pdf\" target=\"_blank\">Read the whole article and see what you think.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The journal Nature has this week published an interesting comment piece aimed specifically at educating politicians about the scientific approach to data but which could just as easily be used for many different types of data.\u00a0 The \u201ctwenty tips\u201d are as useful in helping us remember how to judge educational data and to avoid simple<a class=\"button\" href=\"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/teaching-learning\/2013\/11\/22\/twenty-tips-for-interpreting-scientific-claims\/\" title=\"Read More\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":1364,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1363","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-comment-piece"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/teaching-learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1363","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/teaching-learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/teaching-learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/teaching-learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/teaching-learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1363"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/teaching-learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1363\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/teaching-learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/teaching-learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1363"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/teaching-learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1363"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.lboro.ac.uk\/teaching-learning\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1363"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}