Factors Considered by Secondary Students When Judging the Validity of a Given Statistical Generalization

Hanan Ayoub Innabi

doi:10.29333/iejme/182

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Hanan Ayoub Innabi

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Abstract

This study investigated the factors that 12th grade students in the United Arab Emirates take into consideration when judging the validity of a given statistical generalization, particularly, in terms of the sample size and sample selection bias. The sample consisted of 360 students who had not studied sampling yet. Results show that a small percentage of the students take the sample size and selection bias into consideration properly. Many students based their judgment on their personal beliefs regardless of the properties of the selected sample. This study identified some pre-teaching misconceptions that students have with regard to sampling. Such misconceptions include ‘any sample represents the population’, and, ‘any sample does not represent the population’.

Keywords

Statistical Thinking
Sampling
Judging Generalizations
Secondary School Students

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This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Article Type: Research Article

INT ELECT J MATH ED, Volume 2, Issue 3, October 2007, 168-186

https://doi.org/10.29333/iejme/182

Publication date: 12 Dec 2007

Article Views: 3164

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How to cite this article

APA

Innabi, H. A. (2007). Factors Considered by Secondary Students When Judging the Validity of a Given Statistical Generalization. International Electronic Journal of Mathematics Education, 2(3), 168-186. https://doi.org/10.29333/iejme/182

Vancouver

Innabi HA. Factors Considered by Secondary Students When Judging the Validity of a Given Statistical Generalization. INT ELECT J MATH ED. 2007;2(3):168-86. https://doi.org/10.29333/iejme/182

AMA

Innabi HA. Factors Considered by Secondary Students When Judging the Validity of a Given Statistical Generalization. INT ELECT J MATH ED. 2007;2(3), 168-186. https://doi.org/10.29333/iejme/182

Chicago

Innabi, Hanan Ayoub. "Factors Considered by Secondary Students When Judging the Validity of a Given Statistical Generalization". International Electronic Journal of Mathematics Education 2007 2 no. 3 (2007): 168-186. https://doi.org/10.29333/iejme/182

Harvard

Innabi, H. A. (2007). Factors Considered by Secondary Students When Judging the Validity of a Given Statistical Generalization. International Electronic Journal of Mathematics Education, 2(3), pp. 168-186. https://doi.org/10.29333/iejme/182

MLA

Innabi, Hanan Ayoub "Factors Considered by Secondary Students When Judging the Validity of a Given Statistical Generalization". International Electronic Journal of Mathematics Education, vol. 2, no. 3, 2007, pp. 168-186. https://doi.org/10.29333/iejme/182