Statistics

Better, Worse, Same

Authors: Mikel Aickin
Comments: 11 Pages.

A success probability provides a very simple summary of how well some group is doing, and so it is natural to use comparisons of success probabilities across groups as an attempt to quantify which groups are doing better. But all such conventional comparisons are made from the viewpoint of the observer, not from the outlook of someone trying to choose which group to join. Choice of a particular group typically imposes a cost of some kind, and so the decision must be based on the trade-off between the cost and the probabilistic benefit. The purpose here is to define the probability of benefit and to provide a method to analyze it, with particular attention to choosing medical treatments.
Category: Statistics