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How statistics can be misleading - Mark Liddell

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  • 25,396 Questions Answered
  • TEDEd Animation

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Statistics are persuasive. So much so that people, organizations, and whole countries base some of their most important decisions on organized data. But any set of statistics might have something lurking inside it that can turn the results completely upside down. Mark Liddell investigates Simpson’s paradox.


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About TED-Ed Animations

TED-Ed Animations feature the words and ideas of educators brought to life by professional animators. Are you an educator or animator interested in creating a TED-Ed Animation? Nominate yourself here »

Meet The Creators

  • Educator Mark Liddell
  • Script Editor Alex Gendler
  • Director Mike Foster, Tom Sanders
  • Producer Tom Sanders
  • Compositor Mike Foster, Tom Sanders
  • Animator Mike Foster, Tom Sanders
  • Sound Designer Tom Lowe
  • Narrator Addison Anderson
Additional Resources for you to Explore
Statistics can be used in a powerful and useful ways. In what ways could this world data be analyzed in order to help society? Take a look at this site! Any ideas about this information could be used to improve the lives of people?

Are there ways that we can analyze statistics visually? This site provides some helpful tools for analysis. Take a few moments and look through the site for some ideas about visual representations of data. What does Hans Rosling do to visually represent data that allows connections to be seen so readily? Take a look at this link. Then, watch some TED Talks by Hans Rosling to get more ideas about how data and statistics can be represented.

There are many different ways that statistics can be analyzed. Consider some of the helpful examples at this site.

Customize this lesson

Create and share a new lesson based on this one.

About TED-Ed Animations

TED-Ed Animations feature the words and ideas of educators brought to life by professional animators. Are you an educator or animator interested in creating a TED-Ed Animation? Nominate yourself here »

Meet The Creators

  • Educator Mark Liddell
  • Script Editor Alex Gendler
  • Director Mike Foster, Tom Sanders
  • Producer Tom Sanders
  • Compositor Mike Foster, Tom Sanders
  • Animator Mike Foster, Tom Sanders
  • Sound Designer Tom Lowe
  • Narrator Addison Anderson

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