> I also see this sort of thing done sometimes to make results more easily > interpretable (and applicable?) for doctors and other clinicians. Some of > them struggle with interpretation of coefficients for continuous > variables, and have a clear preference for categorical predictor > variables. >
This is a good reason, for instance, dietary advice often involves dramatic reduction in things like saturated fat, so you would compare 90th percentile to 10th percentile, (say in a logistic regression for risk of heart disease) not caring about the Beta, of the full spectrum of saturated fat. An Odds Ratio of 1.5 looks better than an odds ratio of 1.00001 . . ================================================================= Instructions for joining and leaving this list, remarks about the problem of INAPPROPRIATE MESSAGES, and archives are available at: . http://jse.stat.ncsu.edu/ . =================================================================
