Everything else is ready: study the parts, the key terms and the quiz below.
Simpson's Paradox and Subgroup Comparisons
Explain how an aggregate comparison can point in a different direction from the comparisons within relevant groups.
In this lesson6 parts
- 01Rebuild the aggregate claim
- 02Count within the declared subgroups
- 03Find the different applicant mixes
- 04Standardize to one declared mix
- 05State the claim and its limit
- 06Reproduce and challenge
Key terms
The words this lesson introduces, each in one line. The module’s glossary collects them all.
- subgroup
- Records selected by a declared category, such as department.
- denominator
- All applicants in the stated subgroup.
- Simpson's paradox
- An aggregate comparison can reverse when relevant subgroup composition is accounted for.
- composition
- How each group's applicants are distributed across departments.
- weighted average
- Subgroup rates combined according to declared subgroup shares.
- standardization
- Recomputing group rates under one declared subgroup mix.
- causal claim
- A claim that a change in one factor produced an outcome change. This table alone does not identify one.
Quiz 5 questions
Your first pick on each question is the one that counts, and a right one earns a coin. Getting one wrong here is how the lesson sticks.
Practice
Problems to solve in your own notebook. Each states the problem, not the steps: working out the steps is the exercise. Level A applies the lesson, B combines it with earlier ones, C stretches it.
The self-checking notebook for this lesson is Simpson's paradox and subgroup comparisons.
Common mistakes
What you will see when it goes wrong, why it happens, and the fix.
Where it’s used
Where this lesson’s ideas turn up in real work.