Business Statistics Made Easy in SAS

Appendix A to Chapter 12: More on Accuracy (optional)

Background

As explained in the main chapter, point values of statistics have the disadvantage that on their own they cannot be used to assess how accurate they are. To assess accuracy, you need more. For example, perhaps you need confidence intervals that give a range for the statistic at a certain level of confidence.

To properly explain how we form p-values and confidence intervals, I will start with the best-case scenario for assessing accuracy — which we cannot usually achieve — and then show how we compromise by forming p-values and confidence intervals.

(Unrealistic) Best Case for Assessing Statistical Accuracy

Usually when you do a statistical analysis you draw a sample to ...