Enhancing Learning in Statistics Classes through the Use of Concrete Historical Examples: The Space Shuttle Challenger, Pearl Harbor, and the RMS Titanic

Schumm, Walter R.; Webb, Farrell J.; Castelo, Carlos S.; Akagi, Cynthia G.; Jensen, Erick J.; Ditto, Rose M.; Carver, Elaine Spencer; Brown, Beverlyn F.

doi:10.2307/3211484

Cited by 18 publications

(17 citation statements)

References 39 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

Contrasting

Order By: Relevance

“…In the RMS Titanic disaster, the lowest survival rates for men and the highest survival rates for women and children were among the middle class passengers, suggesting a new nonlinear theory of social class and compliance with social rules. The Challenger disaster could have been predicted in advance with simple statistics ( Schumm, Webb, Castelo, Akagi, Jensen, Ditto, et al ., 2002 ). There are many other examples, in this author's own experience, in which research did not turn out as might have been expected.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Navigating Treacherous Waters—One Researcher's 40 Years of Experience with Controversial Scientific Research,

Schumm

2015

Comprehensive Psychology

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Science often must deal with issues that are politically controversial. However, there are dangers in dealing with controversial research and serious risks to the process of doing science and to the credibility of science, particularly social science. Here, I discuss lessons learned from engaging in and criticizing controversial research for nearly four decades. Social science research as a process is being damaged by questionable research practices, several of which are discussed. Social science results are being misrepresented through a variety of weak or incorrect methodologies, each of which is discussed. Discourse about social science results often shifts from academic discussion into attempts to discredit those with whom one may disagree. Science and the public are not being well served by these problems, so new researchers and policymakers need to be aware of them. For teaching purposes, examples are also presented of controversial research in which new analyses off er diff erent results than previously reported.My journey dealing with controversial research may have begun with my older brother's dissertation ( Schumm, 1966 ), about which he told me, when I was 15-yr. old, that probably one-third of what scientists had thought they knew about the research topic had been incorrect. That situation imbued me with a certain sense of skepticism about scientifi c research on one hand, but a sense of optimism on the other hand that one could -through better science -correct such things and make improvements. Only later did I fi nd Cohen (1990 ) saying essentially the same thing with respect to social science -"One of the things I learned early on was that some things you learn aren't so" (p. 1304).Even well-known historical events can be deconstructed statistically to show that things did not occur as we have been led to believe. Here are some examples of which readers may or may not be aware. The week before Pearl Harbor, the U.S. was trying to ambush the Japanese. In the RMS Titanic disaster, the lowest survival rates for men and the highest survival rates for women and children were among the middle class passengers, suggesting a new nonlinear theory of social class and compliance with social rules. The Challenger disaster could have been predicted in advance with simple statistics ( Schumm, Webb, Castelo, Akagi, Jensen, Ditto, et al ., 2002 ). There are many other examples, in this author's own experience, in which research did not turn out as might have been expected. Grover, Russell, Schumm, and Paff -Bergen (1985 ) showed that the best predictor of later marital satisfaction was the length of time taken before the decision to marry, not the length of engagement. Gwanfogbe, Schumm, Smith, and Furrow (1997 ) reported that in some situations a wife might be happier in a bigamous marriage. Hendrix, Jurich, and Schumm (1995 ) showed that adverse eff ects on a veteran's family life after observing prisoner abuse lasted for decades. In Moxley, Eggeman, and Schumm 1 Address correspondence to Dr. Schumm, S...

show abstract

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Navigating Treacherous Waters—One Researcher's 40 Years of Experience with Controversial Scientific Research,

Schumm

2015

Comprehensive Psychology

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…For example, some years ago, some of my graduate students and I looked into the survival rates on the RMS Titanic and found that middle class passengers were the ones that most closely followed the rule "women and children first", contrary to the media idea that the rich men left the poor women and children to drown. We also looked at Pearl Harbor and found some statistical evidence about the situation that suggested the U.S. government knew more about the upcoming Japanese attack than has been acknowledged [82]. More recently, a graduate student and I looked at the survival rates of different classes of passengers on the Korean ferry MW Sewol.…”

Section: Opportunities To Find Interesting Results In Unexpected Placesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In the case of the Titanic, for example, I don't think there are any liberal Western social science theories (e.g., social exchange, systems, feminist, functionalist, developmental, Marxist, post-modern) that would have predicted the rate of survival as a function of social class in a way that corresponded to the actual facts (of a nonlinear pattern between survival rates and social class) whereas there already was a sociological explanation of sorts from over two thousand years ago in Proverbs 30: 9 from that worldview perspective [82]. It may be that this is true of other worldviews, from outside the West, as well.…”

Section: Conservative Viewpoints May Lead To Different But Useful Waymentioning

confidence: 99%

A Conservative’s View from the Academic Trenches: Reply to Duarte, Crawford, Stern, Haidt, Jussim, and Tetlock (2015)

Schumm¹

2016

JBBS

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Although conservative scholars may face a variety of forms of discrimination in academia and other challenges, as elaborated in the first part of this comment, they may also have a set of unique advantages that may facilitate more careful theoretical and empirical scientific work. They may be more sensitive to flawed methodologies in some areas of controversy. In such areas, these assets of conservative scholars may be especially important.

show abstract

“…Despite these measures, many women and children did not make it to a lifeboat. Data for the list of surviving and lost passengers and their ticket class were obtained (Butler, 1998;Schumm et al, 2002) as presented in Table 2 but may differ from estimates elsewhere.…”

Section: Rms Titanicmentioning

confidence: 99%

Teaching Statistics with Current and Historical Events

Lee

Schumm

Lockett

et al. 2016

Comprehensive Psychology

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Statistical examples can feel remote to students, especially if the variables under consideration are ambiguous. However, life or death is not ambiguous but very concrete. Three different historical shipwrecks offer an abundance of ways to demonstrate the relevance and importance of statistics. Here, we discuss statistical outcomes associated with the loss of three ships: the HMT Birkenhead in 1852, the RMS Titanic in 1912, and the Korean ferry MV Sewol in April 2014. These disasters can serve as examples for demonstrating the relevance of statistics to current events. Statistics in these historical events can help students see that the survival rates of different groups of passengers were very different, with medium to large effect sizes. Even if statistical analyses cannot answer all of the questions about why some passengers had higher survival rates than others, they can lead to further productive qualitative or quantitative research into such questions.

show abstract

Enhancing Learning in Statistics Classes through the Use of Concrete Historical Examples: The Space Shuttle Challenger, Pearl Harbor, and the RMS Titanic

Cited by 18 publications

References 39 publications

Navigating Treacherous Waters—One Researcher's 40 Years of Experience with Controversial Scientific Research,

Navigating Treacherous Waters—One Researcher's 40 Years of Experience with Controversial Scientific Research,

A Conservative’s View from the Academic Trenches: Reply to Duarte, Crawford, Stern, Haidt, Jussim, and Tetlock (2015)

Teaching Statistics with Current and Historical Events

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About