Question

“Strictly speaking, statistics don’t lie, but they can be easily manipulated and distorted.”

Then give an example of where you have seen statistics being used in a non-representative way, in an incorrect way, or taken from an unreliable source.

Give measures you will take to ensure that you provide statistics accurately, and in the context they were intended.

Answer 1

Colgate, a toothpaste company, has infamously distorted statistics in the past in an attempt to boost their credibility and consequently their sales. They made a claim that more than 80 per cent of dentists recommend its toothpaste and this claim appeared on several posters and adverts. This finding was supposedly obtained through telephone surveys of dentists and hygienists carried out by the manufacturers.

However, it was found that the survey allowed each dentist to recommend more than one toothpaste. This meant that there was a chance that other toothpastes had an equal chance of being recommended as much as Colgate’s. Therefore, the statistics incorrectly implied that Colgate was preferred 80% of the times by dentists, over and above other toothpaste brands.

In order to report statistical information accurately, I would ensure that I give out all the contextual information along with it. Even if detailed information cannot be shared, I would, at the very least, provide some information about the conditions under which the findings were found. This would allow the reader to make their own assessments of the meaningfulness of the statistical data.