Statistics and the media: A statistician’s view

How should statisticians interact with journalists? The author, an academic statistician, has worked with journalists in several ways over the years. The article explores the many-sided relationship between scientists, journalists and the public, from the point of view of the statisticians involved. One pessimistic view of the role of numbers in news is that they are there largely for rhetorical reasons, to increase the credibility and authority of a story. The author would not subscribe to that view, but it does point to a potential need to educate readers as well as journalists in dealing with numbers, and the article briefly discusses a checklist intended to help the consumers of media stories about risks to choose what to ignore. The article concludes by presenting some reasons for being optimistic about the position of statistics in journalism

Tackling the mathematics problem

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International Social Survey Programme: Religion IV - ISSP 2018

Attitudes towards religion and religious practice Topics: Assessment of personal happiness; satisfaction with relationships with family members; attitudes towards extramarital sex; attitudes towards homosexual relationships between adults; attitudes towards abortion if family has very low income; gender roles in marriage; institutional trust (parliament, business and industry, churches and religious organisations, courts and legal system, schools and educational system); attitudes towards the influence of religious leaders on voters; attitudes towards science and religion (too much trust in science and too little religious faith, more conflicts through religions than peace, intolerance of people with strong religious convictions); assessment of the power of churches and religious organisations in the country; acceptance of a person from different religion as spouse of a relative (social distance); attitudes towards freedom of expression for religious extremists in public meetings, on the Internet and in social media; doubt or firm belief in God (scale deism); past or present belief in God; belief in life after death, heaven, hell, religious miracles and supernatural powers of deceased ancestors; attitude towards a higher truth and the meaning of life (God concerns himself with human beings, people can do little to change life (fatalism), life is meaningful because God exists, life does not serve any purpose, own actions give meaning to life, own way in connecting with God without church or worship services); Opinion on gender equality in one´s own religion; religion of mother and father in the respondent´s childhood; religion the respondent raised in; frequency of church attendance by father and mother in the respondent´s childhood; personal frequency of church attendance at the age of 11-12; frequency of prayers; frequency of participation in church activities (apart from attending church services); read or listened to religious scriptures outside of church services in the last 12 months (e.g. Bible, Koran, Torah or other religious scriptures); shrine, altar or religious object (e.g. cross) in the respondent´s home; frequency of visiting a holy place (shrine, temple, church or mosque) for religious reasons; self-assessment of religiousness and spirituality; religion helps people to make friends and to gain comfort in difficult times; religions are a barrier to equality between women and men; opinion on the separation of state and religion (government should not interfere with attempts of religion to spread); opinion on the peaceful coexistence of people belonging to different religions; religion represents the past and not the future; religion is as relevant to life today as in the past; personal attitude towards different religious groups (Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Jews, atheists or non-believers); self-assessment of health status. Optional items (not in all countries): born-again experience; feelings about the Bible; new commitment to religion after a turning point; belief in lucky charms, fortune tellers, faith healers and horoscopes; decision criteria for personal actions (laws or religious principles); perceived threat of people belonging to different groups (Christians, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Jews, non-believers); people can be trusted vs. can´t be too careful in dealing with people; belief in reincarnation and Nirvana; country’s laws should not be based on religion. Demography: sex; age; year of birth; years of full-time schooling; country specific highest completed degree of education; highest completed degree of education (derived from country specific degree) ; current or former employment status; hours worked weekly; employment relationship; supervision of other employees; number of other employees supervised; type of organisation: for-profit vs. non-profit and public vs. private; occupation (ISCO/ILO-08); main status; living in steady partnership; trade union membership; religious affiliation or denomination (country specific); groups of religious denomination (derived from country specific religion); attendance of religious services; top-bottom self-placement; vote participation in last general election; country specific party voted for in last general election; left-right scheme of party voted for in last general election (derived from country-specific parties); ethnic group 1 and 2 (country specific); household size; household composition: number of adults in the household; number of children above school entry age in the household; number of children below school age in the household; personal income (country specific); household income (country specific); legal partnership status; father´s and mother´s country of birth (migration background); place of living: urban – rural; region (country specific). Information about spouse/ partner on: current or former employment status; hours worked weekly; employment relationship; supervision of other employees; occupation (ISCO/ILO-08); main employment status. Additionally coded was: respondent-ID; case substitution flag; interview date (year, month, day); weight; mode of data-collection; country (ISO 3166, country/ Sample ISO 31666, country/ Sample Prefix ISO 3166); flag variable indicating partially completed cases

International Social Survey Programme: Work Orientations IV - ISSP 2015

Attitude towards work. Work orientation. Conflict and social exclusion. Subjective experience of job. Work satisfaction. Non-standard employment. Work life balance. Job and working flexibility. Human capital. Outcome of work. Employability, new job. Topics: work centrality (a job is just a way of earning money vs. would enjoy having a paid job even if the money is not needed); importance of selected demands of a job like job security, high income, etc. (work values); work life balance: willingness to give up good job opportunities for the benefit of the family; willingness to remain in a job that is not satisfying for the benefit of the family; conflict and social exclusion: experience of discrimination with regard to work, for instance when applying for a job; main reason for the discrimination; experience of harassment at the workplace by superiors or co-workers (for example bullying, physical or psychological abuse); solidarity and conflict with regard to trade unions (workers need strong trade unions to protect their interests vs. strong trade unions are bad for the country´s economy); preferred employment arrangements (full-time, part-time, less than 10 hours a week, no paid job at all); currently working for pay (employment status); preference for more work (and money) or for reduction in working hours (work longer hours and earn more money, work the same number of hours and earn the same money, or work fewer hours and earn less money); characteristics (social dimension) of own job; subjective experience of job: frequency of hard physical work and stressful work; non-standard employment: frequency of working at home during the usual working hours and working on weekends; job and working flexibility concerning starting and finishing times; non-standard employment: usual working schedule in the main job; job and working flexibility: organisation of daily work (free decision, decision within certain limits, no free decision); work life balance: difficult to take an hour off during working hours to take care of personal or family matters; demands of the job interfere with the family life and the demands of family life interfere with the job; human capital: usefulness of the abilities learned from past work experience for the present job; job training over the past twelve months to improve job skills; judgement on the relations between management and employees and the relations between workmates/ colleagues (working atmosphere); outcome of work: work satisfaction in the main job; identification with firm or organisation; occupational commitment (would change the present type of work for something different, proud of the present type of work); employability/ new job: expected difficulties in finding a new job at least as good as the current one; likeliness of job search in the next twelve months; worried about the possibility of losing own job; job and working flexibility: accepted concessions to avoid unemployment (acceptance of a job that requires new skills, acceptance of a lower paid position, acceptance of temporary employment, longer travel to reach the place of work, movement within the country, movement to a different country); existence of a side job in addition to the main job; earning from the additional job(s) in total compared with the main job. Respondents who are not currently employed were asked: ever worked for pay for one year or more; month and year the last paid job ended; work satisfaction in the last job; main reason for the end of last employment; interest in finding a paid job; expected difficulties in finding a new job; worried about the possibility of not finding a job; accepted concessions in order to get a job (acceptance of a job that requires new skills, acceptance of a lower paid position, acceptance of temporary employment, longer travel to reach the place of work, movement within the country, movement to a different country); job seeking activities in the past twelve months and training to improve own job skills; currently looking for a job; main source of economic support; worried about the possibility of losing this main economic support. Optional items: recent work histories: ever worked for pay over the past five years; experience of selected changes in working life (unemployment for a period longer than three months, change of the employer, change of the occupation, started own business/ became self-employed, took up an additional job); self-assessment of current financial situation; change of current financial situation compared to five years ago; expected financial situation in five years; attitude towards senior citizens´ work (good for the country´s economy, employed people aged 60 and over take jobs away from younger people). Optional background variable: self-assessment of physical and mental health. Additional compulsory background variable: age of the youngest child in the household. Demography: sex; age; year of birth; years in school; education (country specific); highest completed degree; work status; hours worked weekly; employment relationship; number of employees; supervision of employees; number of supervised employees; type of organisation: for-profit vs. non profit and public vs. private; occupation (ISCO-08); main employment status; living in steady partnership; union membership; religious affiliation or denomination (country specific); groups of religious denominations; attendance of religious services; top-bottom self-placement; vote in last general election; country specific party voted in last general election; party voted (left-right); self-assessed affiliation of ethnic group 1 and 2 (country specific); number of children; number of toddlers; size of household; earnings of respondent (country specific); family income (country specific); father´s and mother´s country of birth; marital status; place of living: urban – rural; region (country specific). Information about spouse/ partner on: work status; hours worked weekly; employment relationship; supervises other employees; occupation (ISCO-08); main employment status. Additionally encoded: respondent-ID number; date of interview (year, month, day); case substitution flag; mode of data collection; weight