That mysterious sentence begins a NYT article.
What kind of analysis sees the answer to a question that is not asked?
The analysis, an extrapolation based on adult responses to a federal survey, represents an indirect way of arriving at a figure that many advocates consider to be of crucial importance.So if you really, really want a number badly enough, a number can be derived?
[T]he researchers applied an advanced statistical technique regarded by some academics as an emerging gold standard for making state estimates using national data, based on well-worn demographic and geographic patterns...An emerging gold standard. Some academics.
Posts
98 comments:
Activists exaggerate data to their purposes. I don't believe any of this shit anymore untill it's simmered. For years.
One out of 142 would identify as a horse. If you asked them. Because teenagers like to mess with your head.
That's a whole 3,000 per state.
Wait a few years until transgenderism goes back out of fashion, then ask.
One out of 142 would identify as a horse. If you asked them. Because teenagers like to mess with your head
Yes. Three out of four American teenagers like to fuck with adults heads.
I wouldn't be surprised that more teens are identifying as transgendered, especially girls. There are no more young Butch lesbians, they now all identify as a man. It's the thing to do.
Another way to see that "Statistic" is that very few men playing a woman will use the Public Restrooms. Ergo: It is not a hill to die upon.
The article mentions only L.G.B.T. No Q. In my view, that alone makes it suspect.
"If asked". Right. Since not asked, mental telepathy is conveying these results to 'researchers'.
Don't ask cats. They'll ruin the data.
Old psych experimenters' rule.
The New York Times is party to transgender conversion therapy targeting prepubescent children, adolescents, and young adults pushed by social liberals. Apparently, they have normalized the acceptance the "final solution", [class] diversity, and are now progressing to promote other dysfunctional orientations and behaviors. Since these are antithetical to evolutionary fitness and social viability, there is a question of what special and peculiar interests, foreign and domestic, are influencing American politics, culture, and development.
I see how you can predict what's in the boys' minds, but I doubt the statistic works on girls.
One reasons I voted for Trump was because he included queer people. Democrats tend to pretend we don't even exist. Either that or they simply find us to be deplorable. Very illiberal.
Way back in graduate school I learned about 'randomized response' as means of getting truthful answers to embarrassing questions. For example, "Have you ever had an abortion?" Respondent would roll die, in secret. If '6' then answer 'Yes'. Otherwise answer truthfully. Statistical analysis can derive the true proportion yes. However, Professor Althouse's noting 'emerging gold standard' and 'some academics' is spot on.
That's some tortured writing for sure. It doesn't give a hint about the methods used. They might as well have said "the researchers used fancy statistics."
"Another way to see that "Statistic" is that very few men playing a woman will use the Public Restrooms. Ergo: It is not a hill to die upon."
I don't think that's a full analysis. It also matters how many men will exploit the situation. That might be far more. I don't know.
But I agree with you, it's a hill I want nothing to do with. We have far, far more important hills..
What kind of analysis sees the answer to a question that is not asked?
Just look at the headline. It's not fake news; it's hypothetical news.
We're moving into an age where the subjunctive mood is taken for the indicative. We're losing the ability to separate fact from non-fact.
Does not pass the smell test.
Another story from the School of Making Up Shit that fits our narrative. Figures don't lie but liars can figure.
What kind of analysis sees the answer to a question that is not asked?
Deduction.
They use the same "scientific" techniques to come up with global warming. Or climate change if you prefer.
Science is a little different nowadays than it used to be.
Statistics show that 93% of suburban white males identify as Gangsta, dawg.
I am Laslo.
is this how they were so smug that Hilary Clinton would win even all day election day?
"An emerging gold standard. Some academics. "
The postmodern view of science summed up in a sentence. It's funny that conservatives have now co-opted this language. I'm waiting for Alan Sokal to troll people with an article about how certain statistics are just a social construct: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sokal_affair.
The fact that their estimation methodology finds that West Virginian teens are the most likely to identify as transgender could be counterintuitive and illuminating! Or, it could be a flag that their extrapolation isn't working right. I tend to think the latter . . . Same with the disjunction between Minnesota and Iowa. Article is also kind of weak given that it handwaves an "advanced statistical technique" without telling us what it is.
I suppose I could probably figure it out if I googled all the parties involved, but come on -- journalist ought to know that's at least as important as most of the other details called out in the article. One appositive, all you need: "an advanced statistical technique, [INSERT NAME HERE"
That's the kind of stuff that gives fake news a bad name.
Talking with a Grandma (in her fifties) in the neighborhood today. Her daughter wants a third child. Gma says, with a boy and a girl already, a third child is likely to be gay.
Gma really believes that "gay" is another legitimate sex. All her info comes from MSM and watching TV.
So, I was curious and looked up the reports (you can see them for yourself here if you don't want to rely on the, ah, the "Failing New York Times" or FNYT as they say these days (haha).
The population of states from which the data is extrapolated included both Iowa and Minnesota in 2014, so the disjunction there may be real (maybe it's Minneapolis? Or the proximity of the Canadian border?). West Virginia looks even weirder here, though, since the adult population (based on their extrapolation as of June 2016) has rates of transgenderism less than half what they are extrapolating for the children. There's two years (2014-2015) of data underlying the child extrapolation, though, vs 2014 only for the adults, so they're not quite apples-apples.
Anyhow, I don't emerge convinced that what they're doing is actually working. The estimates seem high, although their low-end estimates in the adult extrapolation don't seem impossible.
I took a survey design course long ago when I was studying outcomes research.
Low income and low education subjects particularly try to provide the answer they think the surveyor wants.
You always ask the question in ways that use two approaches. One seems to want the yes. The second ask seems to want the answer no.
You always use the two approach method if you want honest data.
Who thinks this survey did so ?
If I had a dime for every young women I knew who went through a Lesbian or bi-sexual phase and then went on to marry a man and settle down....I'd have a shitload of dimes.
If you want to have an estimate of how many trans teens there are in the U.S. this isn't a bad way to go about it until an appropriate survey is conducted.
I think the piece that most are missing is that the % of people identifying as transgender was found to be higher at younger ages in adults. That shouldn't be surprising since the acceptability of trans identification has increased in recent years, so younger trans people will be more comfortable identifying as such. The extrapolation to teens essentially gives them the same likelihood of trans identification as the 18-24 year old group (0.7%).
Re: Michael K:
The question the survey asked is: "Do you consider yourself to be transgender? YES / NO" And there's a set blurb for respondents who don't know what "transgender" means.
I think the bigger problem is the extrapolation, which may or may not be capturing the demographic characteristics that predict transgenderism.
Re: Triangle Man:
It's not a bad way to go about it, but I do think the Times writeup leaves out the kinds of caveats that would be appropriate when using this kind of methodology. Really, there's so much work that is done on public policy that seems to lack appropriate controls and safeguards.
I do a lot of accounting-related work, and when a public company wants to use a model to estimate something that goes in its financial statements, there's all kinds of things the outside auditor is supposed to assess in terms of the validity of that model, the inputs and assumptions, and all that (see AU 342 in the old numbering, or AU 2501 in the new numbering), even when the model is absolutely bog standard. And so you have these huge undertakings with model reviews and backtests and cross-period consistency checks and access controls to prevent tampering or inadvertent corruption of the data, and assessments of estimate uncertainty, and all that.
And I compare what I see in companies that are trying to develop and validate models for estimates that -- frankly -- most readers of the financial statements don't care about anyhow, to stuff like this, and the public policy research just seems so much more slapdash. I'm sure they try to be rigorous, but they just don't seem to have the same kinds of controls. And I'm certainly not accusing the Williams Institute of this, but one hears about social scientists or public policy researchers refusing to share their data or their models with researchers who might disagree with them, and it just leaves me feeling like a lot of this research is kind of junk.
Also on Michael K's point, my favourite illustration of the importance of survey design (from Yes Minister or course) is this,
would identify
Science from the twilight zone (a.k.a. penumbra) in service of the social complex and political progress.
" it just leaves me feeling like a lot of this research is kind of junk."
MOST psychology research results cannot be reproduced using the methods used.
Over the course of four years, 270 researchers attempted to reproduce the results of 100 experiments that had been published in three prestigious psychology journals.
It was awfully hard. They ultimately concluded that they’d succeeded just 39 times.
The failure rate surprised even the leaders of the project, who had guessed that perhaps half the results wouldn’t be reproduced.
The new paper, titled "Estimating the reproducibility of psychological science," was published Thursday in the journal Science. The sweeping effort was led by the Center for Open Science, a nonprofit based in Charlottesville. The center's director, Brian Nosek, a University of Virginia psychology professor, said the review focused on the field of psychology because the leaders of the center are themselves psychologists.
That's all research not just the subjects that are politically hot right now.
We need to get Nate Silver to work this issue. He was the gold standard for the election. Hillary won. Right?
Given the current law in California...I would. two years ago I would have marched into my principal's office..announced that i was a lesbian trapped in a man's body (I actually claimed this at the time anyway) and that I now wanted to use the girl's restrooms, locker room and to compete on the girl's teams.
Of course..I was the class clown.....
One of Althouse's former UW colleagues, George Box, said "all models are wrong, but some are useful."
Your audited models sound very useful indeed if they require that kind of validation.
I wish the press could better communicate the results of work like this. It usually boils down to readers accepting results that they agree with and dismissing results that they don't agree with. Again, these estimates have a use until someone can get better data to make more useful and more precise estimates.
The state-level estimates for T% look too wonky to be very useful. I think that's from noise. If not from a small marginal sample size, then within some demographic subgroup that is underrepresented in the data.
This is the same kind of stuff they used to find the missing heat from global warming that their theory predicted.
It turns out that the heat flees instruments and hides under 2000 meters,which is the limit of the robot submarine probes.
Achilles:
Global Warming and Climate Change are natural phenomenon. It's when they are qualified with Anthropogenic that they become Catastrophic. Hence the prophecy of Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming, or Catastrophic Anthropogenic Climate Change when feeling uncertain. This is not to be confused with Catastrophic Anthropogenic Immigration Reform (CAIR), including refugee crises, which is caused by social justice adventurism.
In the ocean. Kind of an important point.
If their estimate is correct, then transgenderism is a progressive condition. Combined with abortion rites, friendship with "benefits" (i.e. polygamy without commitment), and other forms of social liberalism, this explains CAIR, including: refugee crises, illegal immigration, and excessive immigration. Still, who would have guessed that women would be liberated to serve as womb banks for dysfunctional individuals and couplets, and males would redistribute sperm to the same demographic. Progress.
@Michael K
The Hidden Brain podcast did a good episode on reproducibility. The idea that results that aren't reproduced should be disregarded is incorrect. They are results that raise additional questions to be answered.
@David Begley
Silver had Trump with a reasonable chance of winning. Hilary's odds were better, but betting on the long shot pays more.
So if you really, really want a number badly enough, a number can be derived?
87% of all statistics are made up on the spot.
Sadly, Michael K. is right about most of the psychological research of the last 30+ years.
The combination of political agendas and improved data mining techniques have produced a boatload of worthless findings. Many semi-competent academics have '"earned" tenure with such research. Yet, it is worse that that.
Back in the late 70's and early 80's, a ton of psychological lab studies) examined causal inferences (e.g., where the" blame the victim" trope came from). The studies were extremely rigorous by todays standards. Eventually, a wise soul from UCLA asked if people actually make spontaneous causal attributions or if they mostly do so when asked by researchers.
Result: end of that research line. Of course, no-one lost tenure from their attribution theory work.
"The idea that results that aren't reproduced should be disregarded is incorrect."
Regardless, it make them useless.
This wouldn't have happened 20 years ago. When the media blasts degeneracy 24/7 at young people it will have an effect. No one openly talked about sex changes, cross dressing, and genital surgeries 20 years ago. Or worse, brought it up in a classroom at a public school! That garbage was relegated to the bathrooms of NYC nightclubs. Disgusting.
loudogblog said...
If I had a dime for every young women I knew who went through a Lesbian or bi-sexual phase and then went on to marry a man and settle down....I'd have a shitload of dimes.
Hence the terms LUG and SLUG. Especially common at the Seven Sisters Colleges. And if you don't already know what the terms mean, you haven't been paying attention to alternative lifestyles very long.
"Of course..I was the class clown..... "
...until graduation?
"multilevel regression and poststratification." In other words they extrapolated based on limited surveys asking the question: Do you consider yourself transgender? Here are the details:
http://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/research/transgender-issues/new-estimates-show-that-150000-youth-ages-13-to-17-identify-as-transgender-in-the-us/
http://www.princeton.edu/~jkastell/MRP_primer/mrp_primer.pdf
Balfegor: thanks for perspective on the QC process for financial modeling. You are IMHO right to wonder at the sloppy work done on sociological-psychological studies: as the recent article in Science makes pretty clear.
I guess the explanation is, all the smart kids went into fields where they could work with numbers. Those who couldn't hack it, ended up doing hypothetical transgender surveys.
What is the power of this study? Is it designed to answer the question or just keep the topic simmering?
Best case we are looking at 150,000 kids in a country of 320 million people. And the kids' issue is, what, exactly? They are feeling confused (as if that could be measured objectively)? They want some respect (as if that could be measured objectively)? What exactly is the "ask" here, beyond "I am soooo special"?
More detail from report:
"Do you consider yourself to be transgender?
YES
NO
[If Yes] Do you consider yourself to be male-to-female, female-to-male, or gender non-conforming?
If the interviewer is asked for a de nition of transgender, they respond:
Some people describe themselves as transgender when they experience a di erent gender identity from their sex at birth. For example, a person born into a male body, but who feels female or lives as a woman would be transgender. Some transgender people change their physical appearance so that it matches their internal gender identity. Some transgender people take hormones and some have surgery. A transgender person may be of any sexual orientation – straight, gay, lesbian, or bisexual."
http://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/research/transgender-issues/new-estimates-show-that-150000-youth-ages-13-to-17-identify-as-transgender-in-the-us/
I would like to know more about what "gender non-conforming" means? That you can walk into which ever bathroom or locker room you feel like at the moment? They need to break out this number.
Has there ever been such an Althouse poll with a result like this? We nearly all agree.
Dean at the NYT needs to take note.
Michael K said...
Low income and low education subjects particularly try to provide the answer they think the surveyor wants.
I certainly agree with that 110%!
I don't see how "transgender" can be based on genetics if there are these wide variations from state to state - 1 in 100 or 1 in 250 and so on.
Don't these variations suggest that in different states the cultural situation influences how people see their own gender vs the other? Aren't these kids thinking that their situation as a child or teenager would be better if they were the other sex because of the culture they are in? - i.e., a big-boned fat girl in NYC might think it would be better to be a big fat boy whereas in Guam or Hawaii where large women are more acceptable that perception might never form because the social situation was so different. And will they feel the same as an adult? Suppose such a girl goes through surgery and hormone flooding in NYC and then moves to Hawaii and sees that it was all unnecessary. She isn't much of a man and nothing at all of a women - and for nothing. Then what?
How different is it from hating your skin color or type of hair because of your cultural situation?
Interesting, that's the same ratio of immigrants from Muslim countries.
Hey, two can play this game.
Q: You know what you get when you cross a pig with a Muslim?
A: Nothing! There's some things a pig just won't do!
...is this considered hate speech? Was that wrong?
Luke Lea said...
report: "For example, a person born into a male body, "
That strange wording makes it sound as if a "person" is some foreign substance injected into a body, rather than being the body itself. I wonder why? he wondered, twirling his mustaches.
Psychological research on political topics is absolutely useless. It's the same problem that Global Warming had. It was a hot political subject and the advocates got hold of the funding. Nobody could get a grant to study the errors in the models.
Try to get a grant to study the outcomes of children raised by gay "parents."
If you indicate any doubts that they are just fine and wonderful, forget getting a grant or getting anything published.
rhhardin said...
Don't ask cats. They'll ruin the data.
99.7% of cats are outliers. They'd say that if they were asked.
The other day on NPR I heard about an 8-year-old FTM transgender kid. Honestly, how can anyone possibly know so young that they were "born into the wrong body"? In my day they were called "tomboys," and treated like girls, with a measure of indulgence. Now, they're treated as literal boys, and surgically altered as quickly as possible. I think this is literally insane, but it appears I'm in the minority.
If this is a genetic marker across a broad population, why does it crop up three times more often in West Virginia than Iowa? The best guess is these researchers drew their numbers out of a hat.
I don't see how anyone with a straight face could defend using this kind of "data" to allocate government "services." Emerging gold standard, indeed.
The early McKinsey studies concluded that 10 percent of American men were homosexual, the term at the time. It took years for people to ask whether people who were willing to answer detailed questions about their sex lives constituted a truly representative sample of American adults in the 1950s, but the conclusion was reported as Truth for a very long time.
You don't have to understand what transgender means -- and I do not -- to understand that these individuals' lives are not easy. I always have had gay friends, and I do not question that they are who they say they are. What bugs me is being expected to take this kind of reporting at face (fake) value.
Balfegor's link from Yes, Prime Minister is apt. It's high time someone called bullshit on all of these 'polls'.
In the midst of the gay marriage debate I read estimates of the gay population as high as fifteen percent. After the court decision I saw those estimates had disappeared and the latest "data" suggested less than five percent. Unexpectedly.
The referenced trans "survey" so called is junk.
So there are 40 million people in the US aged 10-19 (Google) and the prevalence of transgender ID overall is thought to be around one-half of one percent. This gives 100,000 to 200,000 kids 13-17 by emerging-gold-standard multiplication. The point, I think, is that it's still a lot of people even if a small percentage. The NYT just wants to sound sophisticated.
A very long time ago, in a Galaxy far far away, when I was in college in the 60's a very smart (they were then) Stat Professor said this: There are Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics. Hold true today too.
That is the value of the fine structure constant so it must be correct!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fine-structure_constant
Michelle Dulak Thompson: "...Now, they're treated as literal boys, and surgically altered as quickly as possible.". This is the horrifying part. I think the confused (coerced?) statements of identity and desired change in a core function, is about as reliable as the testimony of children in the Fell Acres day care inquisition. But as bad as that case was for the railroaded and ruined defendants, at least they were not mutilated by their benevolent protectors and patrons. Here? A rush to put kids under the knife, or to mess with their hormones at vital points in their development, is going to result --guaranteed-- in much sorrow and recrimination.
Of course, by then, the activists will be immune to suit and safely out of town.
"An advanced statistical technique regarded by some academics as an emerging gold standard"?
Does this technique have a name? How can a national survey of adults tell you what children in each of the 50 states--who weren't surveyed--think? This story is not worthy of being believed.
There are Lies, Damn Lies and Statistics.
Also attributed to Disraeli.
Michelle Dulak Thompson: "...Now, they're treated as literal boys, and surgically altered as quickly as possible.". This is the horrifying part. I think the confused (coerced?) statements of identity and desired change in a core function, is about as reliable as the testimony of children in the Fell Acres day care inquisition. But as bad as that case was for the railroaded and ruined defendants, at least they were not mutilated by their benevolent protectors and patrons. Here? A rush to put kids under the knife, or to mess with their hormones at vital points in their development, is going to result --guaranteed-- in much sorrow and recrimination.
If they did things like that to animals in research laboratories PETA would be on them like a ton of bricks.
It actually wouldn't surprise me if more teenage girls, having been indoctrinated about the patriarchy and how male privilege makes life better, express an interest in transitioning. Social justice warriors implicitly endorse maleness as the ideal, particularly heterosexual white malenss.
Michael K
Regardless, it make them useless.
Not if the reasons for the different results are understood. The original "non-reproducibility" studies just kind of threw up their hands and said, "welp, they're different, they're fucked". People with domain expertise who find different results than previous studies can offer insights into the reasons for the discrepancies.
Crazy Jane said...
If this is a genetic marker across a broad population, why does it crop up three times more often in West Virginia than Iowa? The best guess is these researchers drew their numbers out of a hat.
Who said it was a genetic marker? It's an estimate of how many teens would answer a question that yes they were transgender under certain assumptions. It is true that the pattern across states is puzzling. That is a limitation that will need to be addressed, probably with better data.
are there any details as to the breakdown between girls and boys
"Not if the reasons for the different results are understood."
Yes, of course, but then they are not properly described as "non-reproducable".
People with domain expertise who find different results than previous studies can offer insights into the reasons for the discrepancies
The reason for the discrepancies is that psychology is not a science and the research is crap.
Neurobiology is going to show why the diseases that psychology pretends to understand are not what they think.
We are reliving the collapse of psychoanalysis.
Assume a public high school with 500 students, evenly divided between male and female (anatomically defined). If 0.7% of the students are transgender, that's 3.5 transgender students, but let's round up to 4. As far as I can tell, the study doesn't tell us how the 0.7% is divided between trans-boys and trans-girls, but let's assume it's equal. Let's also assume that none of these these trans-people have been surgically altered and that all have the sexual organs they were born with. So, of those 4 transgender students, 2 are trans-boys (that is, with female sexual organs, who identify as males) and 2 are trans-girls (that is, with male sexual organs, who identify as female).
There are, on these assumptions, 248 girls with female sexual organs who would expect to use the "girls" locker room, bathroom, and shower room, and if they care to look around they expect to see other girls with female sexual organs. There are also 2 trans-girls with male sexual organs who would like to join the club in the "girls" locker room, bathroom, and shower room.
And then there are the 248 boys with male sexual organs who identify as male and who would love to get into the girls' locker room, bathroom, and shower room in order to get a look at girls with female sexual organs (if they have to also see 2 trans-girls with male sexual organs, well that's a price they'll pay). Is the ticket of admission to the girls' facilities just a declaration that you "identify" as female, notwithstanding your organs?
I draw two lessons from this thought experiment. First, it's appropriate to consider how many people would be benefitted, and how many people would be discomfitted, by a change in policy. Second, it's also appropriate to consider the extent to which a new policy may be abused.
When seeking a gold standard, always opt for that "emerging".
Me? I'll wait for an uber-scientific "consensus".
And 25% of the US population is gay.
After a fruitless search for the words complete horseshit in the poll options, I abstained.
As a person with an academic background in "hard" science (2 degrees in Astronomy, one in Comp. Sci) and all the math background that goes along with all the ejimacation, I will say this that the concept of "derived" statistics of this sort is bogus.
As a Catholic, I'd also posit it's immoral.
I'm not trained in legal matters as is our esteemed host, but I also wish the concept was illegal. It's that bad.
you missed this statement
"There has been no authoritative, large-scale questioning of teenagers about transgender identity. "
Didn't Bill Clinton want to use this method to calculate the US census?
Balfegor said...The fact that their estimation methodology finds that West Virginian teens are the most likely to identify as transgender could be counterintuitive and illuminating! Or, it could be a flag that their extrapolation isn't working right. I tend to think the latter . . .
To paraphrase Joe Stalin: The people who extrapolate the known data decide everything.
tola'at sfarim: "are there any details as to the breakdown between girls and boys"
Not necessary as we have been told repeatedly that boys and girls are exactly the same except for all the ways that girls are better.
WOW. The most lopsided poll ever on AA's blog?
"And 25% of the US population is gay. "
Probably not. But according to a "scientific" poll, 98% of us are big queeros.
Not that we were necessarily born that way.
Meade said...
"One reasons I voted for Trump was because he included queer people. Democrats tend to pretend we don't even exist. Either that or they simply find us to be deplorable. Very illiberal."
Because your vote can't be counted on. I find that odd.
It sounds similar to the techniques used by internet advertisers to detect that someone is pregnant long before they have said, done or purchased anything related to childbirth., and long before their best friends or family know. So it could be valid, though I'm not saying it is.
By comparison: about 2 percent of the population is gay. So if you know 1/3 as many transsexual people as gay people, 1/137 is a reasonable number.
I don't think it's reasonable. I think the proportion of gays to transsexuals is probably closer to 10:1 or 50:1. That would be closer to 1/1000 in the population as a whole.
The best paper I've read on the reproducibility crisis:
"What has happened down here is the winds have changed":
http://andrewgelman.com/2016/09/21/what-has-happened-down-here-is-the-winds-have-changed/
.7 of one percent seems a bit high.
Even the staunchest trans-advocates haven't - in my experience - claimed more than half that, tops.
It's interesting that the leftists focus on how sensitive college-aged women are to memories or threats of sexual assault, but don't think high school-aged girls will be bothered at all by having someone in their locker room who they knew as a boy just a week before.
Also, it's been documented that many young teenaged boys with feminine traits often grow out of that stage and follow a male pattern the rest of their lives. Thus any statistics derived in this analysis overstate the real number of expected transgender females.
Post a Comment