In: Statistics and Probability
Identify the most relevant source of bias in each
situation. a. A survey asks the
following: Should the death penalty be permitted if innocent people
might die? b. A study seeks to investigate whether
a new pain medication is safe to market to the public. They test by
randomly selecting 300 people who identify as men from a set of
volunteers. c. A survey asks how many sexual
partners a person has had in the last year. d. A
radio station asks listeners to phone in their response to a daily
poll. e. A substitute teacher wants to know how
students in the class did on their last test. The teacher asks the
10 students sitting in the front row to state their latest test
score.
f. High school students are asked if they have
consumed alcohol in the last two weeks.
a. A bias in this situation might be lack of eyewitness testimony in the case and providing death penalty. Also the pressure on police and procecuters. It will be very bias if the statement of the innocent cannot be justified or more commomly not given importance.
b. Set of volunteers will be medical fellows since they provide patient care and will have information about the new pain medication. So the study will be baised to only medical related fellows. Also only men are chosen and that is a greater bias.
c. A question like how mnay sexual partners a person has had will not be answered by many people. So study will be biased to those who only answer.
d. Listeners to phone in their response to a daily poll will be done by those who willingly do it and the survey will be on a voluntery bases. The response to a daily poll will not be on a random bases.
e. Teacher asking the 10 students sittting in the front bench so that the teacher can finalise the performance of the class on previous test is bias because those 10 students might have got good/bad marks as compared to others. So a random of 10 students must be choosen from the whole class so as to finalise the performance.
f. A bias in such a situation might be asking students of a particular school or of a particular area.