High Level Of Statistical Significance Research Articles

The Effects of Parental Consanguinity and Inbreeding in Hirado, Japan III. Vision and Hearing

The effects of parental consanguinity, age, and sex on defects of the eye and ear, accomodation, mean visual acuity, and mean decibels of hearing loss at four frequencies have been investigated in a series of Middle School children and their parents on Hirado Island, Japan. In the children the effect of paternal and maternal inbreeding on these same indicators has also been investigated. The numbers available for the various analyses after eliminations for incompleteness of records, and confining the analysis to children where socioeconomic data are complete, are given in table III. Age and sex effects are encountered at high levels of statistical significance, but, unlike the results on Hirado with respect to a variety of other indicators [Schull et al., 1970; Neel et al., 1970], socioeconomic effects are negligible. None of the regressions on consanguinity or inbreeding is individually significant, nor is there any consistent pattern to the totality of the regressions. On the other hand, the sampling errors are such that the data cannot be said to conflict with the significant positive findings regarding consanguinity effects in a previous study in Hiroshima and Nagasaki [Schull and Neel, 1965].

Motor Accident Mortality and Compulsory Inspection of Vehicles

The relation between motor accident mortality and compulsory vehicle inspection is examined by regressing age-standardized mortality ratios on inspection and other variables across states. The adjusted coefficient of multiple determination is typically about 0.85. Inspection is negatively related to mortality, but the net effect of inspection is less than one third as large as the gross difference between states that require inspection and those that do not and does not generally differ from zero at high levels of statistical significance. The effect of inspection appears to be greater in states with more than one annual inspection. It is greater in low income than in high income states, and greater in high education than in low education states. Dollar estimates of the benefits of inspection are found to exceed estimated costs; the difference, however, is not as large as is often alleged.

Development of an objective psychological test for the determination of the coronary-prone behavior pattern in employed men

An overt behavior pattern described by investigators of the Harold Brunn Institute of the Mt. Zion Hospital and Medical Center, San Francisco, has been shown in several studies to be associated both with prevalence and incidence of coronary heart disease. The coronary-prone behavior pattern is characterized by intense striving for achievement, competitiveness, aggressiveness, pressures for vocational productivity, excessive sense of time urgency, impatience and restlessness. Because of the importance of this behavior pattern in predicting risk to coronary heart disease, a rapid, objective method for measuring the pattern is needed for use in epidemiologic studies and for mass-screening in industrial health programs. This paper describes the development of a self-administered, machine-scored psychological test to measure this behavioral pattern. The present form of the test questionnaire distinguishes at high levels of statistical significance between groups of men clinically judged to manifest the coronary-prone behavior pattern and those groups judged not to manifest the pattern. Categorization of individuals is also promising. A series of validity studies using biological and medical criteria is underway.

Family Background, Primary Relationships, and the High School Dropout

The high school dropout has become an insistent contemporary theme. The research presented in this article tests the hypothesis that in a lower-class matched sample, the family background of the dropout is less characterized by primary relationships than is the family background of the high school graduate. Using Broom and Selznick's testable criteria of the primary relation as being one that is characterized by mutual acceptance as total persons, deep intercommunication, and personal satisfaction derived from being in each other's company, the study finds the hypothesis sustained at a high level of statistical significance.

THE USE OF A NEW REASONING TEST FOR SELECTION OF UNIVERSITY AND TRAINING COLLEGE STUDENTS

Summary. A “Reasoning Test for higher levels of intelligence” is shown to reveal a difference between mean scores of First and Second Class honours graduates at a very high level of statistical significance, and a similar difference between Second Class honours graduates and those with Third Class honours or with Pass degrees. It is also applicable to candidates for admission to training colleges, many of whom score above the average mean for university graduates. Evidence is given that success in the test depends on innate ability rather than on training or experience.

Reminiscence as a function of drive.

Groups of engineering apprentices were tested on the pursuit rotor under conditions of high and low drive, respectively, and with a 6 min. rest pause occurring after 3 and 8 min. massed practice, respectively; a post‐rest practice period of 4 min. was given to all the groups. Reminiscence scores were obtained by subtracting scores on the last 10 sec. pre‐rest trial from scores on the first 10 sec. post‐rest trial. It was predicted that reminiscence scores would be higher for the high drive group than for the low drive group, and it was also predicted that this difference would be greater after 8 min. practice than after 3 min. practice. Differences were also predicted in level of performance, both pre‐rest and post‐rest. Predictions relating to reminiscence were verified at a high level of statistical significance; those relating to performance were in the predicted direction, but did not support the theory quite as clearly. A model of pursuit rotor performance was constructed on the basis of the data obtained in this experiment, as well as on previously obtained information, which permits quantitative predictions to be made.

POWER SPECTRUM ANALYSIS OF CLIMATOLOGICAL DATA FOR WOODSTOCK COLLEGE, MARYLAND

Power spectrum techniques are applied to series of daily, weekly, and monthly average temperature and precipitation values, recorded since 1870 at the Woodstock Climatological Benchmark Station in Maryland, in order to gain a reasonable interpretation of the extent and frequency distribution of periodic variations in these data. Analysis procedures are outlined, and the results presented, interpreted, and collated with the results of earlier literature in some detail. Apparent short-period variations are found whose periods lie near 3 days, between 5 and 7 days, and between about 15 and 25 days; various of them however, are absent from some portions of the data series and also differ somewhat in character with the season of the year. Significant long-period variations are more prevalent in the temperature series than in the precipitation series. Spectral peaks in temperature, of periods near 2 years and greater than 50 years, both achieve high levels of statistical significance. The 11-year sunspot cycle, and to some extent its second harmonic as well, is suggested in the temperature data. The double (22-year) sunspot cycle and the longer Brückner cycle, however, are almost totally absent. The basis of Abbot's statistical long-range prediction scheme, which utilizes numerous higher harmonics of the double sunspot cycle, is tested against the Woodstock data, and is found in this caw to lack measurable skill above chance.

The use of a control population in neuropsychiatric research; psychiatric psychological, and EEG evaluation of a heterogeneous sample.

A heterogeneous control group of 151 young men drawn from 4 different socioeconomic sources, and a group of 40 patients in whom manifest anxiety was the predominant symptom, were studied by psychological, psychiatric and electroencephalographic means. The 4 subgroups of the control sample were contrasted with each other and with the patients. The 4 control subgroups varied greatly and at a high level of statistical significance with regard to many psychological and psychiatric variables. Members of the total control group labeled by psychological and psychiatric means as emotionally unstable showed trends in their basic resting EEG similar to those found in the patient group. Many other indices often termed pathological occurred with equal or greater frequency among the controls than among the patients. These results suggest that controls from different occupational, social, and economic sources may vary greatly in their psychiatric and psychological characteristics and thus a single source cannot be cons...