{"id":30859,"date":"2023-02-05T22:28:34","date_gmt":"2023-02-06T06:28:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/?p=30859"},"modified":"2023-02-05T22:28:34","modified_gmt":"2023-02-06T06:28:34","slug":"what-a-tangled-web-we-weave","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/what-a-tangled-web-we-weave\/","title":{"rendered":"What A Tangled Web We Weave"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n

I\u2019ve just turned over the last page of How to Read Numbers; I\u2019m vacillating between writing a cheerful blog post or a doomsday one.

On one hand, that was a delightful read. Tom Chivers and David Chivers explain a complicated topic in a very approachable way. The sprinkling of dry humor and clever examples didn\u2019t hurt either.

On the other hand, after reading this, I am never going believe any statistic I read ever again! I knew statistics were tricky and easy to manipulate, but I had no idea there were so many ways to go wrong. To make matters worse, it seems that some of these misleading treatments of numbers can even occur without the author (journalist, unsuspecting doctoral student, etc.) being aware.

I began reflecting on the numbers that I encounter in life and work. The first thing that came to mind is the bi-monthly metrics that we fill out for our organization. As Chivers and Chivers say, \u201cMetrics are necessary. But there\u2019s a trade-off.\u201d [1] We document things like how many gospel conversations occur, how many intentional discipleship relationships we\u2019re engaged in and of course how many took a first-time step of following Jesus. Goodhart\u2019s effect can easily take over here. In an effort to hit certain targets, the behavior that we want to measure can be altered, perhaps becoming less natural or authentic and certainly becoming less effective. There\u2019s also just the simple fact that, as you can imagine, different missionaries interpret these questions differently, so how reliable are the numbers in the end?

Some more numbers I\u2019ve been digging into recently come out of the Fuller Youth Institute. For example, director Kara Powell presents some of the Institute\u2019s research and explains that of children growing up in Christian families 50% leave the faith after high school. She goes on to say that about half of those return later in adulthood especially as they become parents
themselves. [2] Since we have two things going on here \u2013 kids leaving the faith and those same kids eventually finding their way back \u2013 I wonder if Bayes theorem might come into play. I also have questions about exactly how the researchers came up with their sample. How did they avoid sample bias? It\u2019s difficult to know how alarming these statistics really are without getting the answers to these questions.<\/p>\r\n



Also related to my NPO research, I\u2019ve been collecting studies on parenting styles and specifically corporal punishment. This area is a good example of what Chivers and Chivers describe as an \u201caverage result\u201d showing a reliable conclusion over time. [3] Some studies show clear links between corporal punishment and a child later developing all sorts of mental health and behavioral problems. Other studies are less conclusive. These studies also raise the question of causality. So many factors play into a person\u2019s mental health; can a study really point to the fact that they were spanked years earlier? Obviously, it\u2019s probably a lot more complicated than that. (For the record, I\u2019m personally opposed to any form of corporal punishment of children, but I live in a context where spanking is accepted, hence my interest in studying the topic in depth.)

There is one more aspect worth mentioning regarding studies on corporal punishment. There seems to be little discussion regarding absolute vs relative risk. [4] Presumably, every child has a certain risk of becoming mentally ill as an adult. In the studies pointing to an increase in mental illness, at least the ones I have seen, make no effort to relativize the risk due to spanking.

\u201cI wonder, but I don\u2019t have the answers.\u201d That seems to be the conclusion in many of Chivers and Chivers\u2019 examples. We just don\u2019t know. Sometimes it\u2019s a matter of digging a little deeper, looking at the original studies. But sometimes those original studies aren\u2019t available; even if they are, it\u2019s unlikely that I am competent enough in that given scientific field to evaluate the soundness of a study. The authors of How to Read Numbers attempt to land their reflections by giving journalists 11 helpful tips to report statistics ethically. [5] It\u2019s true that if there were higher standards of how to report statistics, we could be more confident in what we read. That said, we can\u2019t just wait around for somebody else, let alone the whole system to change. In the meantime, I will definitely be more skeptical of what I read. From now on, I\u2019ll be taking every statistic with a grain of salt.<\/p>\r\n

 <\/p>\r\n

 <\/p>\r\n

[1] Chivers, Tom, and David Chivers. How to Read Numbers: A Guide to Statistics in the News (and Knowing When to Trust Them)<\/em>. Paperback edition. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2022. 161.<\/p>\r\n

[2] \u201cThe Holy Post\u202f: Episode 171: \u2018Sticky Faith\u2019 with Guest Kara Powell!\u201d Accessed November 15, 2022. https:\/\/thephilvischerpodcast.libsyn.com\/episode-171-sticky-faith-with-guest-kara-powell<\/a>.<\/p>\r\n

[3] Chivers, Tom, and David Chivers. How to Read Numbers: A Guide to Statistics in the News (and Knowing When to Trust Them)<\/em>. Paperback edition. London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2022. 98.<\/p>\r\n

[4] Ibid. 77.<\/p>\r\n

[5] Ibid. 166-171.<\/p>\r\n

 <\/p>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019ve just turned over the last page of How to Read Numbers; I\u2019m vacillating between writing a cheerful blog post or a doomsday one. On one hand, that was a delightful read. Tom Chivers and David Chivers explain a complicated topic in a very approachable way. The sprinkling of dry humor and clever examples didn\u2019t […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":186,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2310],"tags":[2592],"class_list":["post-30859","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-doctor-of-leadership-3","tag-chivers-dlgp02","cohort-dlgp02"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30859","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/186"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30859"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30859\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30863,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30859\/revisions\/30863"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30859"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30859"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30859"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}