Interpretation of Statistical Data: The Importance of Affective Expressions

Abstract

In recent years, research on teaching and learning of statistics emphasized that the interpretation of data is a complex process that involves cognitive and technical aspects. However, it is a human activity that involves also contextual and affective aspects. This view is in line with research on affectivity and cognition. While the affective aspects are recognized as important for the interpretation of data, they were not sufficiently discussed in the literature. This paper examines topics from an empirical study that investigates the influence of affective expression during the interpretation of statistical data by final-year undergraduate students of statistics and pedagogy. These two university courses have different curricular components, which are related to specific goals in the future professional careers of the students. The results suggest that despite differing academic backgrounds in both groups, the participants’ affective expressions were the most frequent type of category used during the interpretation of research assignments.
 First published May 2017 at Statistics Education Research Journal Archives

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