Demystifying Confidence Intervals: Understanding Common Misconceptions

Abstract

Course name Instructor’s name Assignment due date Module 7: Discussion Confidence Intervals Reading the article demonstrated how the confidence interval, like the p-value, is often misunderstood by researchers and the potential impact of this fact on making conclusions from statistical data. The research showed that on average, the participants of the study answered three questions wrong by indicating that false statements about the confidence interval were true. When I answered the questions myself, I answered questions five and six wrong which I thought were true statements about the confidence interval. I found them deceptive since the language used appeared to represent what the interval means and how I would have used it make conclusions from the study. I checked the actual definition of the confidence interval again and I found I was wrong for indicating that the questions were true. Students and professional researchers often misunderstand the confidence interval by assuming that they can assign probability to a single event. Based on the article, some misconceptions about confidence intervals are that it is better than p-values and that estimates falling within the confidence interval are trustworthy. Courts, students, and researchers misunderstand the confidence interval by saying too much about it and what information it provides about the data being analyzed from the study. Even professional researchers and participants who indicated a high level of statistical experience did not perform any better that students or other people from the study. I would explain confidence interval to mean a range indicating a process such that if a study was conducted many times, 95% of the confidence intervals would include the true population mean in the case of the 95% confidence interval. I would tell someone who has not taken the course that the confidence...