Sample Excerpt: Interpreting Statistics

Sample Paper Excerpt

A psychologist, E. Mavis Hetherington, published the results of a longitudinal study of 1,400 families and 2,500 children, primarily to track the effects of divorce on children. (For Better or Worse: Divorce Reconsidered, 2002).

In a story in a local newspaper, with the headline: Children of Divorce Do Fine, Dr. Hetherington summarized the complex study and findings for the reporter by saying that children in families where a divorce occurred were only slightly more likely to have serious problems (behavior problems in school, substance abuse, delinquency, or teenage pregnancy) than children from non-divorced families. The article cited a finding:

'About ten percent of kids in non-divorced families have these problems, and only about 22 percent of the kids from divorced families have these problems, not much different.'

Is the researcher's conclusion supported by the statistics?

Yes – the difference reported supports the conclusion.
No – not enough evidence reported to justify the conclusion.

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