Statistics

Statistical application and the interpretation of data is important in health care. Review the statistical concepts covered in this topic. In a 750-1,000 word paper, discuss the significance of statistical application in health care. Include the following:Describe the application of statistics in health care. Specifically discuss its significance to quality, safety, health promotion, and leadership.Consider your organization or specialty area and how you utilize statistical knowledge. Discuss how you obtain statistical data, how statistical knowledge is used in day-to-day operations and how you apply it or use it in decision making.Three peer-reviewed, scholarly or professional references are required.Prepare this assignment according to the guidelines found in the APA Style Guide, located in the Student Success Center. An abstract is not required.

Suppose that you have two sets of data to work with. The first set is a list of all the injuries that were seen in a clinic in a month’s time. The second set contains data on the number of minutes that each patient spent in the waiting room of a doctor’s office. You can make assumptions about other information or variables that are included in each data set. For each data set, propose your idea of how best to represent the key information. To organize your data would you choose to use a frequency table, a cumulative frequency table, or a relative frequency table? Why? What type of graph would you use to display the organized data from each frequency distribution? What would be shown on each of the axes for each graph?

Analytical Methods

Module 3: Sampling and Estimation

Scientists rarely collect data from the entire group or population they want to study. For example, if researchers want to study characteristics of individuals serving prison sentences in state and federal correctional institutions, they will find that the most recent data collected was at year-end 2016 and that 1,505,400 individuals were incarcerated at that time (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2018). Because 1.5 million people is a large group or population which would be impractical and expensive to collect data of interest, researchers need to break the sample down into smaller sample groups that, hopefully, are representative of the larger population. From the smaller samples, researchers can estimate population information using inferential statistics.

A great deal of thought, planning, and attention to procedural detail is necessary when sampling from a larger population. Study samples must not only generate a sample that is likely to be representative of the larger population but must also generate a sufficient number of cases/observations that will provide enough statistical power to produce meaningful data. In criminal justice recidivism studies, researchers interested in specific types of recidivism are often faced with sampling difficulties because base rates (the rate at which some phenomena are observed in the real world—such as sex offender recidivism—is relatively low). Medical researchers face the same challenges when studying the causes of certain diseases that may have low base rates of occurrence.

Module 3 lays important groundwork for understanding sampling, probability sampling, normal distributions, and inferential statistics. It also provides important information on the degree of confidence researchers strive for (confidence intervals) in their estimates or predictions.

Learning Outcomes

Distinguish probability sampling from non-probability sampling.
Understand sampling distribution and the central limit theorem.
Comprehend the relationships among sample size, confidence level, and confidence intervals.
Interpret confidence intervals.

Please take note that the Module 3 Discussion (initial post due on Thursday at 11:59PM) is an evaluation of a published research study dealing with predictors of satisfaction between police-prosecutor relationships. Take some time to read the study so that you can provide a thorough answer to the discussion question. Also, be aware that the Module 3 Portfolio Project Milestone focuses on identifying at least one published research study on your topic of interest, and the creation of a research question and hypothesis. This is worth up to 25 points and is due Sunday at 11:59PM. Again, ask your instructor if you need guidance in any of the above areas and they will be glad to help.

For Your Success & Readings

In data analysis, we need both descriptive statistics and inferential statistics. Remember that descriptive statistics summarize the attributes of the unit(s) of measurement in your sample (e.g., age, race, education, income, gender). In criminal justice, nearly every research study (whether the study examines offenders, victims, or criminal justice personnel) contains data on group differences relative to the variables measured. Module 2 covered how to generate descriptive statistics in SPSS, and how to describe and summarize data utilizing tables, graphs, and histograms.

Module 3 covers inferential statistics, which are appropriate when analyzing relationships among variables or assessing population parameters. For example, if we want to know the extent to which mandatory sentencing guidelines have influenced time served in prison vs. the extent to which discretionary sentencing by judges has influenced time served in prison, we would utilize statistical tests that produce data on how the variable of sentencing guidelines is correlated with prison time served. Another example relates to the extent to which correctional treatment completion (or a lack of correctional treatment completion) predicts recidivism.

Understanding the concept of sampling is important to learning inferential statistics, because inferential statistics aim to judge a population using sample data. Module 3 covers the groundwork, evolving from the types of samples, to sampling distribution, to the relationship between sample size, and confidence intervals. Type of sample determines a sample’s representativeness of the target population; sampling distribution provides a major simplification en route to statistical inference based on a probability sample; and sample size determines the preciseness, or the level of confidence, of the sample estimates.

Required

Chapters 6 & 7 in Social Statistics for a Diverse Society
Chapter 9 in Logic of Hypothesis Testing in Online Statistics Education: A Multimedia Course of Study

Recommended

Kuang, K., & Liang, B. (2015). Efficiency and justice and fairness: An empirical analysis of criminal appeals in hunan province, China. European Journal on Criminal Policy and Research, 21(4), 565-590.
Williamson, E. J., Stricker, J. M., Irazola, S. P., &Niedzwiecki, E. (2016). Wrongful convictions: Understanding the experiences of the original crime victims.Violence and Victims, 31(1), 155-166.

Next

References

Bureau of Justice Statistics. (2018). Prisoners in 2016. 

United States Census. (2017). A basic explanation of confidence intervals. 

Discuss the quantitative research designs. For each design, detail issues of researcher control and responsibilities, data collection, data analyses, and presentation of results.

Project Purpose: Design a research study where you apply the statistical methods that you learned and discussed this past semester.

First: Select a topic. Your topic must be approved by your instructor (2 points)

You will want to select a large topic where you can gather background information.

Topic Ideas:
• Weight loss among children
• Weight loss among adults
• Increase SAT scores among high school students
• Stress management among US workers
• The time students spend on social media
• Do certain subpopulations get mammograms more frequently than others?
• Smoking cessation programs
• Contraceptive use
• Blood pressure reduction
• Depression among US citizens
• Cholesterol management among women
• Cholesterol management among men
• Diabetes management among children
• Diabetes management among adult
• Driving and texting
• Suicide prevention
• Alcohol abuse among teenagers.
• Pollution and the environment
• Animals in captivity vs the wild
• Alternative medicine to controlling allergies.
• Faith healing and depression

Project Requirements:

Introduction (15 points)
• State your topic
• Choose a sample and a population
• We discussed different sampling techniques. Choose a sampling technique, and how you will apply it to your research.
• Will this be an observational or experimental study? How?
o Discuss the strategies to address this issue. You can create strategies, or you can research other strategies that have been used. You are allowed to replicate another study, but you must state and cite that you are replicating another study. YOU CANNOT COPY SOMEONE ELSE’S RESEARCH. YOU MUST TAILOR IT FOR THIS PROJECT AND ITS REQUIREMENTS.
• What do you hope to achieve?
• How long will this research occur?
• Who are the stakeholders? A stakeholder is someone who has a vested interest in a program/project.
• How will you measure success?
• This should be about one to two paragraphs

Background Information. (15 points)
• You need one to two paragraphs about why this topic is an issue. How have other researchers addressed this issue? How have other researchers succeeded or failed?
o Some of the topics may have a lot of information, so you may want to narrow your focus.
• For the background information, you need to include at least two charts and/or graphs that we discussed this past semester. Copy and paste those charts in this paper and provide citations.
o Provide a paragraph describing and analyzing the data in those charts.
o Discuss why the information presented in those charts is relevant to your research. You have to use charts that we discussed this past semester: pie chart, bar graph, stem plot, frequency table, dot plot, and box plot.
• What will you do different/similar?

Research Methods: (40 points)

(You are required to use the statistical strategies discussed in this class.
• What background information will you need on your research participants?
• What variables will you measure in your study?
o For example, if we are studying weight loss, some variables will include, height, weight BMI, gender, age.
• Are those variables qualitative or quantitative, discrete or continuous, nominal, ordinal, interval, or ratio level or measurement or neither. You can even use a chart to describe the information. I have provided a sample.
• Which measures of center and variation will apply to each variable?
• Variables of interest can include survey questions.

Variable of interest
Qualitative or Quantitative or neither
Continuous or discrete or neither
Measures of Center that will be used
Measures of variation that will be used.

• You must use two additional statistical methods from the list the following list and describe how it applies to your research. Remember each statistical procedure has its own requirements and those requirements must be satisfied.
o Binomial probability distributions
o Central Limit theorem
o Confidence Interval
o Hypothesis testing
• How will you measure success?

Bias (8 points)
• How will you control and reduce bias in your research? Every research is subject to some sort of bias.

Limitations of your research: (5 points)

• Every research will have a set of limitations. Do not feel embarrassed about mentioning the limitations of your research.

Conclusions (5 points)
• What lessons will you learn from this research?
• How will it benefit other researchers?
• What would you improve in the future?

Works Cited Page will be required. (5 points)

Assignment Six: Design and Data-Collection Methods
Clearly and concisely answer the following questions:
1. Introduction paragraph – Include your research question(s), hypothesis, PICO and variables. No more than one paragraph.
2. How will you collect the data for your study?
3. Will you conduct an experiment, administer a survey or questionnaire, implement focus groups or 1:1 interviews, and/or combine several of these methods (or perhaps utilize a different method)
4. When, where, and by whom will your data will be collected?
5. What expertise and experience qualifications will you seek in your data collectors, how will?you recruit and train them, and what will be done to avoid or minimize bias among them?
6. What are the feasibility issues that may need to be addressed (e.g., agency cooperation with your proposed procedures, recruiting participants, the amount of time it will take for respondents to complete your instruments or interviews, etc.)?
7. What are the strengths, weaknesses, cultural elements, and ethical aspects to consider.
8. Conclusion Paragraph
Each question needs to be its own section with its own heading – I want you to over write here and then you can cut and condense for the final. Lack of clarity will come with a deduction in points. Think through this as instructions – if I picked up your paper, could I do your research?

Power Point Slide

The presentation should be 30-35 slides. The last slide should not be a reference slide since the full reference for the article being critiqued will appear on the first slide. Present the information in the order listed in the following guideline with an appropriate title on each slide.Please note: When writing about a study that has been done, past tense is used
1~ Title Slide – Identify the title of the article and the author(s) full names, credentials and affiliation. Also, include your name and credentials, NU512-50HY and date. Using APA format, cite the complete reference in a smaller font (size 18) than the rest of the title slide.

2~ Comment on the qualifications of the author(s).

3 ~ Describe why this study is of interest personally and professionally. ~ Purpose of the Study (quote and provide the page number using APA) ~ Research Design (ex. Cross-sectional, Correlational, 1 group tested twice, 2 groups, longitudinal, etc.) ~ Sample Size ~ Description of Sample (describe the actual participants, not the inclusion/exclusion criteria) ~ Provide details from the article and critique each area that follows. Be concise, use titles, use bullet points, and support with information from the book where appropriate and reference.

4 ~ Research Purpose ~ Is the purpose identified clearly? Where does it appear in the article, what section(s) and page #(s)? ~ Is it significant–does the researcher provide a good argument for significance? ~ How is it relevant to nursing/health care ~

5 Literature Review ~ Is it balanced, presenting literature that supports and that differs from the researcher’s position? ~ Is the review written critically (giving strengths and weaknesses of previous work)? ~ Is the review composed only of primary sources? Are references current, or a combination of current and classic?

6 ~ Concepts/Variables ~ Are the concepts (variables) defined clearly from a theoretical standpoint? ~ Are the concepts in the study appropriate to the problem? ~ Are the concepts relevant to nursing practice? ~ Are the means to measure the concepts appropriate?

7 ~ Design (overall) ~ Is the design clearly stated? What design was used? ~ How many times was data collected? Is this appropriate for the design being used? ~ Is the design appropriate to answer the research question?

8 ~ State the sample size and if there is more than one group being compared, the number of participants in each group? ~ Is the sample size adequate? Describe why. (Hint-Rule of 30.) Do not use a reported Power Analysis from the article.~ Is the sample likely to be similar to members of the appropriate population overall ~ Are the criteria for including and/or excluding people or items from the sample ~ clear and appropriate?

9 ~ Instrument: ~ How many instruments were used in the study? Provide the proper names. How many questions are on each instrument? ~ How are they scored (Likert scale, yes/no, true/false, etc.), and what do the scores represent (ex: the higher the score on HHI represents higher levels of hope). ~ What is the Cronbach Alpha Coefficient for reliability for each instrument completed by the participants in the study being critiqued?

10 ~ Data Collection: ~ Are the data collection methods described clearly? ~ Are the data collection methods appropriate? Could the researcher have affected the results of the study in some way related to the collection of data?

11 ~ Ethical Considerations ~ Does the researcher indicate that approval was obtained from appropriate institutional review boards? ~ Were the rights of human subjects protected (Was confidentiality maintained or were participants anonymous to the researcher? Freedom from coercion)? ~ Is there any possibility that the subjects might have felt pressured to participate or their responses influenced in some other way?

12 ~ Tables: (Address the 1st two items individually for each table; the remaining 6 items are about the tables in general ~ Describe what type of information has been displayed on each table. ~ Do the tables have a precise title? ~ Is the amount of information presented on each table appropriate? ~ Are the tables organized in a logical order? ~ Do the tables make it easier to understand the research findings? ~ Are the tables visually appealing? ~ Do the tables use an appropriate font type and font size? ~ Provide one suggestion to improve the display of information.

13 ~ Discussion and Interpretation of Findings: ~ Does the researcher discuss the findings in regards to previous research?~ Does the researcher discuss the findings in regards to the theoretical framework? ~ Does the researcher identify limitations of the study? How do these affect the quality of the study? Does the researcher discuss implications for practice? Are these appropriate? ~

14 Application to Nursing Practice:~ How applicable would the findings be to Advanced Nursing Practice in the U.S.?

15 ~ Suggest appropriate changes to the study’s research method that would improve the study (e.g. change in sample size, a more homogeneous group of participants different ways to collect data, additional times to collect data, etc.). Support comments with citations from your text or another scholarly source.

16 ~ Summary of what was presented in the powerpoint presentation and conclusions about the study critiqued~ You should use photos and/or graphs to enhance your presentation. Select words carefully, use bullets, and slides should appear uncluttered. Presentation should be visually appealing, as well as scholarly.

Discussion: Sampling and Collecting Quantitative and Qualitative Data
It is often not possible or practical to study an entire population, so researchers draw samples from which they make inferences about a population of interest. In quantitative research, where generalization to a population is typically valued, a researcher’s ability to make such inferences is only as good as the sampling strategy she or he uses to obtain the sample. Once an appropriate sample has been obtained, data collection should involve valid and reliable measures to ensure confidence in the results, as well as the ability to generalize the research outcomes. Although generalization is typically not a goal in qualitative research, sampling is just as important in qualitative and mixed methods research, as is obtaining reliable and valid results. Indeed, for quantitative, qualitative, and mixed methods research, sampling strategies and accurate data collection methods are critical aspects of the research process.

Specific methods of data collection (e.g., surveys, interviews, observations) produce specific types of data that will answer particular research questions, but not others; so here too, as covered in previous weeks, the research questions inform how the data will be obtained. Furthermore, the method used to collect the data may impact the reliability and the validity of that data.

For this Discussion, you will first consider sampling strategies. Then, you will turn your attention to data collection methods, including their strengths, limitations, and ethical implications. Last, you will consider measurement reliability and validity in the context of your discipline.

With these thoughts in mind, if your last name starts with A through L, use Position A. If your last name starts with M through Z, use Position B.

Position A: Probability sampling represents the best strategy for selecting research participants.

Position B: Nonprobability (or purposive) sampling represents the best strategy for selecting research participants.

By Day 4
Post a restatement of your assigned position on sampling strategies. Explain why this position is the best strategy for selecting research participants. Support your explanation with an example and support from the scholarly literature. Next, select a data collection method (e.g., surveys, interviews, observations) and briefly explain at least one strength and at least one limitation. Then, identify a potential ethical issue with this method and describe a strategy to address it. Last, explain the relationship between measurement reliability and measurement validity using an example from your discipline.

Be sure to support your Main Issue Post and Response Post with reference to the week’s Learning Resources and other scholarly evidence in APA Style.

Read a selection of your classmates’ postings.

By Day 6
Respond to two classmate who was assigned the opposite position by further supporting or respectfully countering his or her position.

There are several assumptions associated with regression analysis (regression modeling). Discuss some assumptions that must be considered when using statistical modeling.

The question to address is: “What have you learned about statistics?” In developing your responses, consider—at a minimum—and discuss the application of each of the course elements in analyzing and making decisions about data (counts and/or measurements).

In your paper,

Discuss the following course elements:
Descriptive statistics
Inferential statistics
Hypothesis development and testing
Selection of appropriate statistical tests
Evaluating statistical results.
The Final Paper

Must be three to five double-spaced pages in length (not including title and references pages) and formatted according to APA style.
Must include a separate title page with the following:
Title of paper
Student’s name
Course name and number
Instructor’s name
Date submitted
Must begin with an introductory paragraph that has a succinct thesis statement.
Must address the topic of the paper with critical thought.
Must end with a conclusion that reaffirms your thesis.
Must use at least three scholarly sources in addition to the course text.