A Common Sense Approach to Understanding Statistical Evidence

29 Pages Posted: 1 May 2006

Abstract

This article presents a straightforward and intuitive method for understanding and interpreting statistical evidence submitted to courts as proof of factual issues. The goal is to overcome the reader's fear and loathing of statistics by relating all statistical methods to the concepts of numerical differences between numbers and similarities or correspondences between numbers. Throughout the article, the discourse is in conversational rather than technical English. Actual rather than hypothetical cases are used to illustrate and explain statistical tools which gradually increase in complexity as the reader progresses. Cases are drawn from a wide variety of substantive law areas such as civil rights, employment discrimination, contracts, environmental law, energy law, constitutional law, deceptive advertising, and highway traffic safety. The discussion begins with the concept of subtraction and proceeds through percentages and correlations to regression analysis. Using the statistical concept of a standard deviation, which is explained in intuitive terms, statistical evidence of all degrees of complexity is described as a mechanism for ascertaining whether an absolute magnitude or measurable effect is large enough to be legally significant.

Keywords: statistical evidence, standard deviation, statistical significance, correlations, regression

Suggested Citation

Barnes, David W., A Common Sense Approach to Understanding Statistical Evidence. San Diego Law Review, Vol. 21, p. 809, 1984, Seton Hall Public Law Research Paper No. 899773, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=899773

David W. Barnes (Contact Author)

Seton Hall Law School ( email )

One Newark Center
Newark, NJ 07102
United States
201-709-8829 (Phone)
973-642-8194 (Fax)

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