It’s in vogue these days to declare the building blocks of statistical inference irrelevant to assessing the performance of schools. For example, Joel Klein recently argued that statistical ...

When we look in the mirror, it’s easy to see not only the physical attributes that define our unique features, but also the layers beneath that makeup who we are — those tired eyes given as a gift of ...

A behind-the-scenes blog about research methods at Pew Research Center. For our latest findings, visit pewresearch.org. Every survey finding published by Pew Research ...

A behind-the-scenes blog about research methods at Pew Research Center. For our latest findings, visit pewresearch.org. Academic survey researchers tend to differ ...

Learn the steps and see examples of simple random sampling, which ensures each member of a population has an equal chance of ...

Several states with extensive water use databases rely upon the census approach. That is, data are collected for all water users withdrawing amounts greater than a specified threshold that varies from ...

You can’t get into an argument about polls without some wise guy whipping out the “margin of error” to shut down the other side. But what is the margin of error, exactly? (Or, as Gilda Radner’s ...

In what specific cases do quantum computers surpass their classical counterparts? That’s a hard question to answer, in part because today’s quantum computers are finicky things, plagued with errors ...