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If Statistical Significance Tests are Broken/Misused, What Practices Should Supplement or Replace Them?

Texas A&M University and Baylor College of Medicine

Given some consensus that statistical significance tests are broken, misused or at least have somewhat limited utility, the focus of discussion within the field ought to move beyond additional bashing of statistical significance tests, and toward more constructive suggestions for improved practice. Five suggestions for improved practice are recommended; these involve (a) required reporting of effect sizes, (b) reporting of effect sizes in an interpretable manner, (c) explicating the values that bear upon results, (d) providing evidence of result replicability, and (e) reporting confidence intervals. Though the five recommendations can be followed even if statistical significance tests are reported, social science will proceed most rapidly when research becomes the search for replicable effects noteworthy in magnitude in the context of both the inquiry and personal or social values.

Key Words: effect size • hypothesis tests • null hypotheses • significance tests • statistical significance

Theory & Psychology, Vol. 9, No. 2, 165-181 (1999)
DOI: 10.1177/095935439992006


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