What is the question? Mistaking the type of question being considered is the most common error in data analysis

Science

Volumn 347, Issue 6228, 2015, Pages 1314-1315

  Leek, Jeffery T ^a   Peng, Roger D ^a  

^a JOHNS HOPKINS BLOOMBERG SCHOOL OF PUBLIC HEALTH   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

ERROR ANALYSIS;

CANCER CHEMOTHERAPY; CANCER RISK; DATA ANALYSIS; ERROR; GENETIC ANALYSIS; HUMAN; MEASUREMENT; MEDICAL LITERATURE; PRIORITY JOURNAL; REPRODUCIBILITY; SHORT SURVEY; STATISTICAL ANALYSIS; UNITED STATES;

DATA INTERPRETATION, STATISTICAL; REPRODUCIBILITY OF RESULTS;

EID: 84925254670     PISSN: 00368075     EISSN: 10959203     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1126/science.aaa6146     Document Type: Short Survey

References (14)

1. "How science goes wrong," The Economist, 19 October 2013; see www.economist.com/news/leaders/21588069-scientific-research-has-changed-world-now-it-needs-change-itself-how-science-goes-wrong.
2. C. Tomasetti, B. Vogelstein, Science 347, 78 (2015).
3. See www.bbc.com/news/magazine-30786970.
4. Duke's Legal Stance: We Did No Harm, The Cancer Letter Publications (2015); see www.cancerletter.com/articles/20150123-2.
5. A. Potti et al., Nat. Med. 12, 1294 (2006).
6. K. A. Baggerly, K. R. Coombes, Ann. Appl. Stat. 3, 1309 (2009).
7. "Planet with four stars discovered by citizen astronomers," Wired UK (2012); see www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2012-10/15/four-starred-planet.
8. M. E. Schwamb et al.; http://arxiv.org/abs/1210.3612 (2013).
9. A. W. Correia et al., Epidemiology 24, 23 (2013).
10. O. A. Panagiotou et al., Cancer Res. 74, 2157 (2014).
11. E. Oster, Cellphones Do Not Give You Brain Cancer, Five ThirtyEight (2015); see http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/cellphones-do-not-give-you-brain-cancer/.
12. D. M. Lazer, R. Kennedy, G. King, A. Vespignani, The Parable of Google Flu: Traps in Big Data Analysis (2014); see http://dash.harvard.edu/handle/1/12016836.
13. L. R. Jager, J. T. Leek, Biostatistics 15, 1 (2014).
14. A. Gelman, K. O'Rourke, Biostatistics 15, 18 (2014).