From Clive Mather
Meersbrook, Sheffield
Drug trials giving false results is perhaps not the most severe problem
created by using p-values.
Social scientists routinely use p-values to assess significance. The results
of their research are used to shape economic, educational and social policy
affecting millions of people. There is both a direct link between academia and
government, and an indirect one when public opinion is informed by research
results (“surveys show that . . .”). If social scientists’ research is
fundamentally flawed, it is likely to be the source of much human
unhappiness.
