Cohen

Seeing the world through overly rosy glasses

Taboos about power nearly always stem from misuse of power analysis. Sander Greenland (2012) has a paper called “Nonsignificance Plus High Power Does Not Imply Support for the Null Over the Alternative.”  I’m not saying Greenland errs; the error would be made by anyone who interprets power analysis in a manner giving rise to Greenland’s objection. So what’s (ordinary) power analysis?

(I) Listen to Jacob Cohen (1988) introduce Power Analysis

“PROVING THE NULL HYPOTHESIS. Research reports in the literature are frequently flawed by conclusions that state or imply that the null hypothesis is true. For example, following the finding that the difference between two sample means is not statistically significant, instead of properly concluding from this failure to reject the null hypothesis that the data do not warrant the conclusion that the population means differ, the writer concludes, at least implicitly, that there is no difference. The latter conclusion is always strictly invalid, and is functionally invalid as well unless power is high. The high frequency of occurrence of this invalid interpretation can be laid squarely at the doorstep of the general neglect of attention to statistical power in the training of behavioral scientists. Continue reading →