ECON 2500 Lecture Notes - Observational Study, Blind Experiment, Response Bias

• School: York University
• Department: Economics
• Course: ECON 2500
• Professor: all

Document Summary

Econ 2500 winter 2011 xianghong li. Chapter 3 producing data feb 1. Statistics is concerned with interpreting already available data as well as producing new data. This chapter will help you understand: very basic principles of getting trustworthy data, develop a critical view of whether existing data use trustworthy or flawed. Available data: from the library and the internet. Observational study: observes individuals and measures variables of interest. Subjects (usually people) are not asked to do anything other than to respond truthfully to questions. Experiment: deliberately imposes some treatment on individuals in order to observe their responses. Used more frequently in the social sciences. Examples include opinion polls, labour market activity surveys. Usually, not everyone is in a sample. A census includes each individual in the population. Used more frequently in sciences and social experiment is less common. Designating and actually conducting the experiment is important.