Hi Might depend somewhat on your preferred ordering of topics, how you go about teaching hypothesis testing, and when you introduce distributions amenable to talking about confidence intervals.
I've always liked the sign / binomial test to introduce HT because students are able to compute (binomial theorem) probabilities of different outcomes, something they subsequently have to depend on tables / programs for. Also possible to compute Type II probabilities for different Ho false values. Not readily amenable to confidence intervals, except perhaps for normal approximation (but less than ideal for CI?) or if you introduce equivalent z tests for proportion. After sign and its normal approximation, HT can be presented in the context of sampling distribution of mean. Here is where it would be easy to do CI first or in conjunction with HT, given their equivalence (in the crude sense of whether CI contains Ho value). I like to use simulations for HT here to show that M falls beyond z-alpha sigmas the theoretically expected number of times. If I wanted to stick with simulations, I'd have to think about whether it would be as easy to first introduce the idea that MU-null falls outside M+/- z-alpha*sigma expected proportion of times. On the face of it, appears more challenging to grasp but might just be a matter of familiarity with the former approach. So off the top of my head, not clear that introducing CI first has any advantages and may have some costs (at least the way I introduce HT ... e.g., regressing to sign test after discussing sampling distribution of mean strikes me as odd). Nor would I separate equivalent CI and HT approaches too much. Students might mistakenly get the idea that the approaches are more markedly different than they are in fact, notwithstanding all the promotion in some quarters of CI over HT. Take care Jim James M. Clark Professor of Psychology 204-786-9757 204-774-4134 Fax [email protected] >>> Marte Fallshore <[email protected]> 17-Apr-12 3:54 PM >>> I was at the Rocky Mountain Psychological Association meeting last weekend, and there was a talk on confidence intervals. It got me thinking about teaching about confidence intervals before I get to hypothesis testing and then integrating it with each hypothesis test we do. Has anyone out there done that? How did it go? Have you found a book that may be does something like that? Thanks, Marte ************************************************ Marte Fallshore Department of Psychology Central Washington Univ. 400 E University Way Ellensburg, WA 98926-7575 509/963-3670 509/963-2307 (fax) Room 462, Psychology Building Everyone is entitled to their own opinions, but they are not entitled to their own facts. ~Daniel Patrick Moynihan When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a communist. ~Dom Heider Camara I teach for free; they pay me to grade. (anon) ************************************************ --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13251.645f86b5cec4da0a56ffea7a891720c9&n=T&l=tips&o=17352 or send a blank email to leave-17352-13251.645f86b5cec4da0a56ffea7a89172...@fsulist.frostburg.edu --- You are currently subscribed to tips as: [email protected]. To unsubscribe click here: http://fsulist.frostburg.edu/u?id=13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df5d5&n=T&l=tips&o=17355 or send a blank email to leave-17355-13090.68da6e6e5325aa33287ff385b70df...@fsulist.frostburg.edu
