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Faith In Statistics Research Paper

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Belief in Statistics It is not likely that you will go one day without hearing at least one statistic quoted if you watch or access news media or sports programming here in the United States. Statistics are prevalent in most of our daily lives, in fact I would venture to say Americans are obsessed with percentages, probabilities and ratios. Of course there must be some form of tangible evidence to report trends for example, which can be accomplished with good statistics not overbearing statistics. So, why is it that so many are quick to believe reported statistics, even when they appear exaggerated? In this report I will examine people’s faith in statistics, provide an example of statistics taken out of context, and determine how the media …show more content…

Statistics provide hard and fast numbers or evidence to support what is being reported. If statistics are present we may instantly believe what we hear. On the other hand, little or no statistics are presented may result in instant skepticism or disbelief. Merriam-Webster (2015) defines belief, “a feeling of being sure that someone or something exists or that something is true” (para. 1). If we focus on the word feeling in this definition, you can bridge belief to emotion and or values. People’s quick belief in statistics may stem from their biases. Specifically, as Lickerman (2011) noted:
Confirmation bias, which causes us to pay more attention and assign greater credence to ideas that support our current beliefs. That is we, cherry pick the evidence that supports a contention we already believe and ignore evidence that argues against it (para. 9).
In other terms, people can be biased and emotionally bonded with an idea, with or without evidence. Statistics used in a report on something that people possess a preexisting belief in is just “icing on the cake.”
Out of …show more content…

Mainstream media’s intentional play on emotions while reporting gun violence statistics has been identified several times. For example, in the year 2000 various news outlets were reporting statistics showing thousands of children die annually in gun accidents with an average of 12 children dying from gun violence per day (Lampo, 2000). The play on emotions not too long after the Columbine High School shootings presented an exaggerated statistic. Omitted from the reports during that time was the fact that more children were dying from bike accidents and drownings. They were also counting youths up to the age of 20 as children, which encompassed a large group of gang youth killed in gang violence (Lampo,

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