Researchers face growing pressure to report accurate findings, even as they interpret increasingly larger amounts of data. One way to ensure such accuracy? Following sound statistical practices. A team of statisticians, including Carnegie Mellon’s Robert Kass, aims to help researchers do just that in their article, "Ten Simple Rules for Effective Statistical Practice."

Published in PLOS Computational Biology for the journal's popular "Ten Simple Rules" series, the guidelines are designed to help the research community — particularly scientists who aren't statistical experts or who don't have a dedicated statistician on their team — understand how to avoid the pitfalls of well-intended but inaccurate statistical reasoning.

"A central and common task for us as research investigators is to decipher what data are able to say about the problems we are trying to solve," the team wrote. "Statistics is a language constructed to assist this process, with probability as its grammar."

Kass is a professor of statistics and machine learning, and interim co-director of the Center for the Neural Basis of Cognition.

The rules, published online June 9, have received an extraordinary amount of attention, with more than 38,000 page views. It's already one of the top 20 most viewed papers in the series, which includes about 60 total papers.

"The sciences, and, particular the fields of psychology and neuroscience, have come under increasing scrutiny in recent years for sometimes poor statistical practices," said Michael J. Tarr, head of CMU's Department of Psychology. "Straightforward and understandable guidelines as articulated by Kass and colleagues will help tremendously in reminding both students and faculty as to the importance of statistically well-grounded research. Their paper is an instant 'must-read' for anyone who cares about good and reproducible science."

In addition to Kass, the article's co-authors include Johns Hopkins University's Brian S. Caffo, North Caroline State University's Marie Davidian, Harvard University's Xiao-Li Meng, Bin Yu of the University of California Berkeley, and Nancy Reid of the University of Toronto.

Read the 10 simple rules in the full story on the CMU News website.