Transcript Is it possible to predict the stock market?

POLITICS AND SPORTS
DO WE PAY ATTENTION TO
BOTH?
2015 Australian Statistics Competition
Asa Belley, Hussein Alahbdally and Yifeng Fan.
Background and Objective
Young people are often criticized for their lack of interest in politics and school based
academic learning. Many educators seem to believe sports is a great way to reengage
disengaged learners. But including too much sports references in mathematics,
science, etc. may have negative effects. Supporters of opposing teams can split a class,
distracting from learning or otherwise gifted students may feel alienated, especially if
they have a physical disability, upbringing in a different culture or otherwise
considering professional sports a low priority. This research aims to investigate the
effectiveness of sports as a topic to reach all students.
Research Questions
• Can educators reach more students with sports issues than with
political issues?
• Is there a statistically significant difference?
• Or is it simply that students who respond to sport issues are the
same as those who are already engaged in learning.
Data Collection
A short quiz was used to collect the data.
• There were 10 questions 5 of which were political and 5 sport related. (The
questions were organised in a random order with questions 1,4,5,7,10 being
political and 2,3,6,8,9 being sport related.)
• 1 of each group of questions was a multiple choice.
The questions were handed out by a teacher in a classroom thus mirroring the
usual learning environment. All class members were required to participate
ensuring that results don’t only come from the most engaged students . The
survey was conducted in a Year 10 classroom then repeated in a Year 12 and a
Year 8 classroom.
Outliers
Figure 1. Year 10 outliers
Year 10
P. Correct
0
0
1
1
1
1
5
0
3
2
5
3
5
1
3 1
0
0
Outliers S. Correct
1
3
3
5
4
5
4
3
2
4
4
3
4
3
3 3
5
5
P. None
3
4
0
3
4
1
0
2
0
0
0
0
0
0
0 4
0
0
S. None
3
1
1
0
0
0
0
0
0
1
0
0
0
0
0 0
0
0
After administering the first quiz the outliers
(results containing a 5 or a 0) were inspected.
Overall Tendencies in Conditional Distributions
Year 8
Politics
Count
Sports
Percent
Count
Percent
66
37
41.05
20
38.95
27
69.47
2.11
28.42
95
100
95
100
Correct
39
Incorrect
19
No Reply
Total
2
Figure 2 Conditional distribution of Year 8 responses
Year 10
Politics
Count
Year 12
Sports
Percent
Count
Politics
Count
Percent
Sports
Percent
Count
Percent
Correct
34
37.78
64
71.11
Correct
16
21.33
46
61.33
Incorrect
35
38.89
20
22.22
Incorrect
21
28
7
9.33
No Reply
21
23.33
6
6.67
No Reply
38
50.67
22
29.33
Total
90
100
90
100
Total
75
100
75
100
Figure 3. Conditional distribution of Year 10 responses
Figure 4. Conditional distribution of Year 12 responses
Year 8 Pie Charts
Year 8 Sports Questions
28%
2%
Year 8 Political Questions
39%
41%
70%
20%
Correct
Incorrect
None
Figure 5. Year 8 sports question results
Correct
Incorrect
None
Figure 6. Year 8 political question results
Year 10 Pie Charts
Year 10 Sports Questions
7%
23%
22%
38%
71%
Correct
Year 10 Political Questions
Incorrect
39%
None
Figure 7. Year 10 sports question results
Correct
None
Incorrect
Figure 8. Year 10 political question results
Year 12 Pie Charts
Year 12 Sport Questions
Year 12 Political Questions
21%
29%
9%
Correct
51%
62%
Incorrect
28%
None
Figure 9. Year 12 sports question results
Correct
Incorrect
None
Figure 10. Year 12 political question results
Paired T-Test
The above charting methods already indicate higher student
engagement with sports questions, but a paired t-test can be used to
see if the difference is statistically significant.
• H0: Individual students attempt to answer the same number of
political and sports questions correctly.
• HA: Students are more knowledgeable about sports.
Probability of the Null Hypothesis
A computer program was used to calculate the probability that Year
12 students engage with political questions to the same extent, as
they do with sports questions.
t-Test: Paired Two Sample for Means
P(T<=t) one-tail 0.008738
Figure 11. Test results calculated by Excel
If that was true, then similar data could be collected less than nine
times in a thousand attempts. It is more likely that Year 12 students
are not as much interested in politics as they are in sports.
Conclusion
• Considering the results, sports can be used to reach more than
half of the students at all high school year levels.
• Some correlation between sports and political question results
could be seen, but it did not appear to be strong. Implying that
political questions would be effective to reach a significant portion
of students with little interest in sports.
• Year 8s demonstrated remarkably good political knowledge, but
more senior students showed a declining tendency.
Acknowledging Limitations
and
Suggestions for Further Research
• Comparing sport and political knowledge has inherent errors
• All subjects surveyed were students of the same school
• Further research should verify if political interest consistently
declines from Year 8 throughout Australia and what the causes
may be (the actual political scene, a school environment in favour
of sports, etc.)