Simpson's paradox in psychological science: a practical guide
Simpson's paradox in psychological science: a practical guide
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DOI：
10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00513
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发表时间：
2013-08-12
影响因子：
3.8
通讯作者：
Borsboom, Denny
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Kievit, Rogier A.;Frankenhuis, Willem E.;Borsboom, Denny
群体水平上的关联方向可能在组成该群体的子群体内发生逆转，这是一个引人注目的观察结果，称为辛普森悖论。当面对这种模式时，心理学家通常认为它是反常的。在这里，我们认为，辛普森悖论是更常见的比传统的思想，通常会导致不正确的解释可能产生有害的后果。我们通过回顾认知神经科学、行为遗传学、临床心理学、人格心理学、教育心理学、智力研究和模拟研究的结果来支持这一主张。我们表明，辛普森悖论是最有可能发生时，推断得出不同层次的解释（例如，从群体到子群体，或从子群体到个体）。我们提出了一套统计标记指示的悖论，并提供心理测量的解决方案，用于处理悖论时遇到的包括一个工具箱在R检测辛普森悖论。我们表明，明确建模的情况下，可能发生的悖论不仅可以防止不正确的数据解释，但也导致更深入地了解数据告诉我们的世界。
The direction of an association at the population-level may be reversed within the subgroups comprising that population a striking observation called Simpson's paradox. When facing this pattern, psychologists often view it as anomalous. Here, we argue that Simpson's paradox is more common than conventionally thought, and typically results in incorrect interpretations potentially with harmful consequences. We support this claim by reviewing results from cognitive neuroscience, behavior genetics, clinical psychology, personality psychology, educational psychology, intelligence research, and simulation studies. We show that Simpson's paradox is most likely to occur when inferences are drawn across different levels of explanation (e.g., from populations to subgroups, or subgroups to individuals). We propose a set of statistical markers indicative of the paradox, and offer psychometric solutions for dealing with the paradox when encountered including a toolbox in R for detecting Simpson's paradox. We show that explicit modeling of situations in which the paradox might occur not only prevents incorrect interpretations of data, but also results in a deeper understanding of what data tell us about the world.