The Major Problem With Nhst Essay - 1283 Words

The Major Problem With NHST Kirk (1996) had major criticisms of NHST. According to Kirk, the procedure does not tell researchers what they want to know: In scientific inference, what we want to know is the probability that the null hypothesis (H0) is true given that we have obtained a set of data (D); that is, p(H0|D). What null hypothesis significance testing tells us is the probability of obtaining these data or more extreme data if the null hypothesis is true, p(D|H0). (p. 747) Kirk (1996) went on to explain that NHST was a trivial exercise because the null hypothesis is always false, and rejecting it is merely a matter of having enough power. In this study, we investigated how textbooks treated this major problem of NHST. Current best practice in this area is open to debate (e.g., see Harlow, Mulaik, Steiger, 1997). A number of prominent researchers advocate the use of confidence intervals in place of NHST on grounds that, for the most part, confidence intervals provide more information than a significance test and still include information necessary to determine statistical significance (Cohen, Gliner, Leech, Morgan 85 1994; Kirk, 1996). For those who advocate the use of NHST, the null hypothesis of no difference (nil hypothesis) should be replaced by a null hypothesis specifying some nonzero value based on previous research (Cohen, 1994; Mulaik, Raju, Harshman, 1997). Thus, there would be less chance that a trivial difference between intervention and controlShow MoreRelatedCohen’S Paper The Earth Is Round (P0.05) Is A Critique944 Words   |  4 Pagescritique of null-hypothesis significance testing (NHST). In his article, Cohen presents his arguments about what is wrong with NHST and suggests ways in which researchers can improve their research, as well as the way they report their research. Cohen’s main point is that researchers who use NHST often misinterpret the meaning of p-values and what can be concluded from them (Cohen, 1994). Cohen also shows that the NHST is close to worthless. NHST is a way to show how unlikely a result would be ifRead MoreExploring Inferential Statistics and Their Discontents2123 Words   |  9 Pageshypothesis significance test assesses can reduce the risk of misinterpreting the p-value† (p. 1). Should all research adhere to the p = .05 standard for significance? No. Why or why not? This depends on the type of research, the importance to major or minuscule changes in variables, the test population, planning of research, and the physical execution of the study. Significance testing is not automatically a detached assessment of results for which the p-value is an indication towards the size