Re: Women talk only 3.4% more than men

On Jul 10, 12:08 am, Dave Smith <d...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On 8 Jul, 23:21, Lance <LanceG...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:



On Jul 8, 7:45 pm, Dave Smith <d...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On 8 Jul, 11:52, Lance <LanceG...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Jul 8, 10:23 am, Dave Smith <d...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On 7 Jul, 14:33, Peter Brooks <Peter.H.M.Bro...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Jul 7, 10:46 am, Dave Smith <d...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On 6 Jul, 11:56, Peter Brooks <Peter.H.M.Bro...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Here's a strange article from IOL. The title claims that men talk just
as much as women and the text claims that the difference is 'a wash in
statistical terms'. However, simple calculation shows that women talk
3.4% more than men, which is a real enough difference, even from a
sample size of 400 - we aren't given the standard deviation, which
might also be interesting.

Why do journalists do this sort of thing?
" ................................................
The results showed that while the women got through an average of 16
215 words, the men were no slouches, with a daily average of 15 669 -
a wash in statistical terms................."

I think the percentage difference is quite small. My criticism would
be that maybe an unwarranted generalisation is being made from a
sample of students.

Yes, I agree it's a small sample and a big generalisation as well. The
difference is, as you say, 'quite small', but that's rather different
from 'statistically insignificant'!

When I did research many years ago, we used to say a result was not
statistically significant rather than that it was statistically
insignificant. It might be better to talk about statistical
reliability rather than statistical significance.- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

I think a better approach is to add in talk about "effect size".
Statistical significance can occur even when the size of the
difference between groups is small. So, in addition to significance,
we need to say how large an effect (the difference between the groups)
really is. Thus there is good reason to think that men are better than
women at maths, but the effect size is small (and the difference
really only matters when one gets to the extremes of the
distribution).

In this case perhaps the 3.5% difference is significant, but it seems
to me to be a small effect size. Presuming a normal distribution of
talkativeness it would really only make a difference at the extreme
ends of the distribution. There are likely then to be a very small
number of women who are extremely talkative, and who can outtalk any
man.

Yes, and of course there are useful measures of effect size such as
correlation coefficients.

As I noted above, the results are for male and female students.
Results for older people in various circumstances might well be
different.

Do you think women grow more talkative as they age, or that men gro
more taciturn as their heads go grey?

Maybe much depends on people's circumstances as well as on their
personality and age -- their job, who they live with, their hobbies
and leisure activities, etc. As usual, more research is required......

Surely their temperament and happiness are the main variables?
Gregarious people, and happy people tend to talk more, I think.
Unhappy folk mainly spend their time protesting and complaining and
increasingly find it hard to get an audience. Sex differences would
have to be overlaid on top of temperament and happiness. Obviously,
people who are isolated for whatever reason would have less chance of
talking - so the access to company would have to be equalised.

Lance

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Women talk only 3.4% more than men
    ... statistically significant rather than that it was statistically ... really only matters when one gets to the extremes of the ... Presuming a normal distribution of ... Surely their temperament and happiness are the main variables? ...
    (uk.philosophy.humanism)
  • Re: Women talk only 3.4% more than men
    ... statistically significant rather than that it was statistically ... really only matters when one gets to the extremes of the ... Presuming a normal distribution of ... Also on experimental design. ...
    (uk.philosophy.humanism)
  • Re: Women talk only 3.4% more than men
    ... statistically significant rather than that it was statistically ... really only matters when one gets to the extremes of the ... Presuming a normal distribution of ... talkativeness it would really only make a difference at the extreme ...
    (uk.philosophy.humanism)
  • Re: Women talk only 3.4% more than men
    ... statistically significant rather than that it was statistically ... really only matters when one gets to the extremes of the ... Presuming a normal distribution of ... talkativeness it would really only make a difference at the extreme ...
    (uk.philosophy.humanism)
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