Group items tagged

'Significance' is a magazine published by the UK Royal Statistical Society and American Statistical Association. E.g. this article discusses the data we might use to analyse food security, thinking about what sources of data are available and the questions they might help us answer. "data on food insecurity is biased towards the environment in which it was created and the priorities of those who collect or commission it. Data from schools is concerned with reimbursement; government data might be focused on budgetary constraints or accountability; grocery stores could (if willing) tell us what food is bought, but not how it is used; meanwhile, non-profits are most interested in demonstrating impact to funders. There is a wide variety of data sets available, but very few are created with the intent to understand the real drivers of hunger and poverty. The data may be repurposed, but modellers must be especially careful to moderate the assumptions of each data set. ...... It is also especially important that those experiencing hunger and poverty are consulted when designing any data analysis project. The input of domain experts is crucial to the success of data science endeavours, and those experiencing poverty know the right questions to ask."

Cool study showing the potential of data analyses to give us new kinds of insights! What does instagram tell us about peoples' nutrition decisions? Food deserts, or places where people have limited access to fresh food, are usually measured by the distance people have to travel to get to a large grocery store. What's harder to measure is what the residents of these areas are actually eating day to day. To do so, researchers typically have to rely on surveys, ...In a recent study, De Choudhury and her colleagues propose another method: mining Instagram. All those artfully arranged plates, all that latte art, just waiting for someone to analyze it!

Good example of a contentious issue. In an Australian study published today, we show that if the government were to combine taxes and subsidies on a range of foods and beverages, it could substantially improve the health of Australians and potentially free up billions in health care spending.

A headline in The New York Times today reads "In the Shopping Cart of a Food Stamp Household: Lots of Soda." Is it true? The story itself provides hints that the headline is misleading, and likely to damage the image of the SNAP program and its beneficiaries. This is dangerous, considering that many readers look at clickbaity headlines, like the NYTimes one, but don't read stories. SNAP households aren't different than the rest of households. Most Americans buy and drink way too much soda and, as a result, obesity and Type II diabetes have reached epidemic levels. The story says that households that receive food stamps spend 9.3% of their grocery budget on soft drinks, while families in general spend 7.1%. This is one of those cases when reporting just percentages, and not taking into account other variables, such as total spending in groceries, sounds fishy.

Many public conversations we have about science-related issues involve communicating risks: describing them, comparing them and trying to inspire action to avoid or mitigate them. Just think about the ongoing stream of news and commentary on health, alternative energy, food security and climate change. Good risk communication points out where we are doing hazardous things. It helps us better navigate crises. It also allows us to pre-empt and avoid danger and destruction. But poor risk communication does the opposite. It creates confusion, helplessness and, worst of all, pushes us to actively work against each other even when it's against our best interests to do so. So what's happening when risk communications go wrong?

Exhorted by President Trump, federal administrators and many Republican state officials are drafting rules requiring people to work in exchange for Medicaid, housing aid and food assistance. But what happens when the poor live where work is hard to find? In Michigan, the state's Senate has passed a proposal that would exempt Medicaid recipients from a work requirement partly on the basis of geography - if they live in a county where unemployment exceeds 8.5 percent. Michigan's approach, critics point out, would mean that poor, mostly white rural counties are exempted, but not the predominantly black, economically troubled cities of Detroit and Flint.

Everyone makes claims about what works. Politicians claim that stop-and-search policing will reduce violent crime; friends might assert that vaccines cause autism; advertisers declare that natural food is healthy. A group of scientists describes giving all schoolchildren deworming pills in some areas as one of the most potent anti-poverty interventions of our time. Another group counters that it does not improve children's health or performance at school. Unfortunately, people often fail to think critically about the trustworthiness of claims, including policymakers who weigh up those made by scientists. Schools do not do enough to prepare young people to think critically1. So many people struggle to assess evidence. As a consequence, they might make poor choices. To address this deficit, we present here a set of principles for assessing the trustworthiness of claims about what works, and for making informed choices (see 'Key Concepts for Informed Choices'). We hope that scientists and professionals in all fields will evaluate, use and comment on it.

A piece I wrote on how psychology helps us understand fake news and information seeking. Every day we face complex situations in which the information we need, and who we trust to provide that information, has a very real impact on our lives. How do we evaluate the competing claims of politicians on climate change policy, or Brexit; navigate medical information regarding vaccinating our children; or assess the relative merits of diet versus regular foods in adopting a healthy lifestyle?