The Measurement Standard: Blog Edition

Nice People Are More Likely to Win Nobel Prizes. Also, an Intro to Scientometrics.

The Dr. has not won an Nobel prize. Yet.

Nobel prize winners, compared to non-winners, tend to let other scientists take first-author credit, and this is true before they win their Nobel prize:

"...peers of Nobel laureates who were not as successful tried to maintain first authorship for themselves far more often, garnering more glory for themselves. By their forties, Nobel laureates are first authors on only 26 percent of their papers, as compared to their less accomplished contemporaries, who are first authors 56 percent of the time. Nicer people are indeed more creative, more successful, and even more likely to win Nobel prizes."

This is just one of the fabulous tidbits included in today's book excerpt from delanceyplace.com: Nice Scientific Guys Finish First, from Samuel Arbesman’s The Half-Life of Facts: Why Everything We Know Has an Expiration Date. (And if you are not familiar with Delancyplace, they'll email you a daily excerpt from an interesting new book. Go sign up, it's great.)

How Much Data Is Enough? or, To Be or Not To Be: Is Data the Answer?

Seems public relations and social media measurement has gone from not enough data to too much data in the blink of an eye. On this subject, two more-or-less antipodal posts arrived in the in-box today. David Brooks likes data, especially when it proves common knowledge wrong. Thomas Tunquz, on the other hand, argues that too much data can be debilitating.

Go Ahead, Eat That Chocolate -- And Have Some More Coffee, Too!

Just in time for another season of chocolate overindulgence, here's some good news from the New England Journal of Medicine: A country's per capita chocolate consumption is strongly positively correlated with the number of its Nobel laureates. (Messerli, F.H.: "Chocolate Consumption, Cognitive Function, and Nobel Laureates"). So go ahead, have some more chocolate. (But beware of making false assumptions of causation based on correlation.)

Thinking about another cup of coffee? Go ahead and indulge while you read "The Case for Drinking as Much Coffee as You Like" in The Atlantic. Happy Holidays! -- WTP

Breaking News: Chow Model Shows Obesity Caused by Too Much Food

Here at The Measurement Standard we just love mathematical models, so it was with great anticipation that we read the NYTimes article "A Mathematical Challenge to Obesity." Especially because it's an interview with the aptly named Carson Chow, a MIT-trained math and physics whiz, who has developed a model to predict how the human body reacts to changes in diet and exercise.

The Chow model's major finding: The U.S. obesity epidemic is caused by too much food.

At first taste, this breakthrough seems so underwhelming that it makes one sympathize with the Fox News rants about wasted tax dollars and the cluelessness of scientific research.

But on closer reading, there's more to chew on. Mr. Chow's model provides some significant clues as to why people get fat and stay that way:

• Weight-loss diets work, but much more slowly than is commonly thought: They take a year.
• The fatter you get, the easier it is to gain weight.
• The U.S. obesity epidemic has been caused not by genetics or lack of exercise, but by too much cheap food. People have eaten it and gotten fat.

Apparently, that last point is a big deal. Says Mr. Chow:

"Well, what do people do when there is extra food around? They eat it! This, of course, is a tremendously controversial idea. However, the model shows that increase in food more than explains the increase in weight."

Read the whole article here. --WTP

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(Thanks for the image to LOLpie.)

 

The Golden Ratio, Feng Shui, and the Apple Logo

These first two posts demonstrate the relationship between math and design, thanks to GigaOM. (I tried and failed to relate them somehow to public relations or social media measurement, but you measurement geeks will love them just the same):

The Golden Ratio Otherwise Known as Feng Shui in which Feng Shui and mathematics are discussed as linked by the Golden Ratio.

Design of Apple Logo and The Golden Ratio, where the Apple Logo is dissected and found to be built of components built on the ratio of 1:62

And if you want to see more of how the golden ratio appears in apple design (and human faces) visit this tumblr page.

And if you want to learn more about the golden ratio, visit this wikipedia page:

--WTP

  --Bill Paarlberg is editor of  The Measurement Standard blog and newsletter, and of Katie Paine's book “Measure What Matters.” He is also editor of the book “Measuring the Networked Nonprofit,” by Beth Kanter and Katie Paine, which will be published this year by Wiley.
  Follow Bill Paarlberg on Twitter.

The Measurement Standard is a publication of KDPaine & Partners, a company that delivers custom research to measure brand image, public relationships, and engagement. Katie Paine, CEO of KDPaine & Partners, will be glad to talk with you about measurement for your organization.

 KDPaine & Partners' Facebook Page.

Forrester: People Who Use Macs At Work Are Richer And More Productive

I am a long, long time Mac user. After working as a freelance creative in the corporate world for two decades now, I’ve been in many meetings — almost all of them, in fact —  where I’m the only Mac in the room. I’ve tried to stay out of the whole Mac vs. PC discussion, but have been, on very rare occasions, just slightly smug about the whole thing. Now I have to pass this along.

“People Who Use Macs At Work Are Richer And More Productive” is the title of a Business Insider article that reports on new Forrester research that shows that very productive employees are bringing Macs to work. Get this:

IT departments don't usually buy Macs, but high-level employees who can afford to bring their own computer to work are often choosing Macs. "There is a strong correlation between higher corporate average salaries and the number of Macs purchased by employees and brought to the office."

...These employees tend to be the richest and most productive. Forrester suggests that the typical Mac user fits in the segment it calls "power laptop" users, who work an average of 45 hours a week and make 44% more money. "Most of the Macs today are being freewheeled into the office by executives, top sales reps, and other workaholics."

What’s amazing is that I have managed to write this post without saying “I told you so.” Oops. --WTP

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--Bill Paarlberg is editor of  The Measurement Standard blog and newsletter, and of Katie Paine's new book Measure What Matters. The Measurement Standard is a publication of KDPaine & Partners, a company that delivers custom research to measure brand image, public relationships, and engagement.

Why Measurement? The Hazards of Confidence

In the field of public relations measurement, it is a given that decisions based on data are better — better informed and thus wiser and more accurate — than decisions based on gut feelings. That’s the point of measurement: You gather data on your success and use that data to be more successful.

And it’s also a given that there are a great many decision makers out there who do not trust the data. Or the process of measurement. Especially when it points to a decision that is different than the one they would like to make.

As Homer Simpson said, “Facts are meaningless. You could use facts to prove anything that's even remotely true!”

And so I was especially pleased to find, in yesterday’s The New York Times, an intriguing article by Daniel Kahneman: “Don’t Blink! The Hazards of Confidence.” It is about how us human beings are often erroneously over-confident in the wisdom of our judgements, to the point of not doubting our decisions when it is obvious that we should. To the point, in fact, of rejecting even the most compelling demonstrations of our incompetence.

As an example, the author tells a story of researching the effectiveness of stock brokers. He and a partner examined the portfolio performance of 25 brokers over the course of eight years, and found that the brokers were no better than chance at making money. The researchers then had to break the news to the directors of the brokerage:

...we told the directors of the firm... that, at least when it came to building portfolios, the firm was rewarding luck as if it were skill. This should have been shocking news to them, but it was not. There was no sign that they disbelieved us... our findings and their implications were quickly swept under the rug... The illusion of skill is not only an individual aberration; it is deeply ingrained in the culture of the industry. Facts that challenge such basic assumptions — and thereby threaten people’s livelihood and self-esteem — are simply not absorbed. The mind does not digest them. This is particularly true of statistical studies of performance, which provide general facts that people will ignore if they conflict with their personal experience... 

I added the bold italics to that last sentence. Because it made me realize that it is no wonder that there is often such great resistance to measurement and data-informed decisionmaking. As Kahneman goes on to say,

Overconfidence arises because people are often blind to their own blindness... overconfident professionals sincerely believe they have expertise, act as experts and look like experts. You will have to struggle to remind yourself that they may be in the grip of an illusion.

I encourage you to read the article: “Don’t Blink! The Hazards of Confidence.”

I myself, of course, am extremely confident in the effectiveness of public relations measurement. --WTP

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--Bill Paarlberg is editor of  The Measurement Standard blog and newsletter, and of Katie Paine's new book Measure What Matters. The Measurement Standard is a publication of KDPaine & Partners, a company that delivers custom research to measure brand image, public relationships, and engagement.

Department of Forensic Statistics: The Book-Cooking Index

How exciting is this? Statisticians can detect corporate accounting fraud just by looking at the first digits of the numerals in the accounting books!

The Economist Free Exchange blog reports on Jialan Wang’s fascinating application of statistics to corporate fraud. She has applied Benford’s Law to actual accounting numbers to judge if they are faked.

Benford’s Law states that within sets of numerals that span orders of magnitude, the distribution of first digits is strikingly regular: Numerals beginning with 1 occur about 30% of the time, those beginning with 2 about 18% of the time, falling to roughly 5% of the time for the number 9.

The actual formula for Benford’s Law: 

The probability of the first digit from a set of numbers is d is given by

Here's how this comes in handy for detecting corporate fraud. Someone who is faking data, as in cooking business account books, is more likely to choose numbers at random, rather than in accordance with Benford’s Law. Thus the deviation between what Benford’s predicts and what is observed in actual accounts can be taken as a measure of accounting fraud. 

Jialan Wang’s chart above shows the deviation from Benford’s Law since 1960. Note the drop off in 2003-2004 after the enactment of Sarbanes-Oxley. Ms. Wang goes on to break out the data for individual industries:

Be sure to read her discussion of how these curves reflect the Saving and Loan Crisis of the 1980s.

How much do you trust corporations now? Or, as Ms. Wang says: “...it's just one more reason for investors to beware.”

Here is the original analysis by Jialan Wang: “Benford's Law and the Decreasing Reliability of Accounting Data for US Firms.”

See also Tyler Durden’s discussion at Zero Hedge.  --WTP

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--Bill Paarlberg is editor of  The Measurement Standard blog and newsletter, and of Katie Paine's new book Measure What Matters. The Measurement Standard is a publication of KDPaine & Partners, a company that delivers custom research to measure brand image, public relationships, and engagement.

Do The Math: Energy Saved If A Million Men Grew Beards

The Power of Large Numbers. Of Beards.

I have taken to growing a beard each fall. I think of it as installing the winter upgrade. And this morning, while congratulating myself on a very masculine one week’s worth of stubble, I began to think about how a beard is insulation. My body must require less energy to keep warm with a beard than without one. “Wow,” I think, “a beard must be the original green and sustainable energy saving device.” (I wondered, briefly, if a beard could qualify for a tax credit.)

(I am, by the way, not the first guy to think about the insulating qualities of facial hair. Consider the guy who shaved half his face for the winter to judge his beard’s insulating power. That’s him to the right.

Also, last spring, Budweiser sponsored a Save-Water-By-Growing-A-Beard campaign. They figured five gallons of water per shave, which adds up to a lot of water.)

So then I thought, well I must save some small amount of energy by having a beard. I suppose I could turn the thermostat down by some small amount thanks to my greater bodily insulation. Like Jimmy Carter wearing a cardigan around the White House and turning his heat back to 68 degrees F. Maybe it's only a tenth of a degree, or a half of a tenth of a degree. But it’s got to be something.

Now a half of a tenth of a degree (or whatever) on the thermostat is not going to save much on my fuel bill. Or save the planet. But suppose a large number of men grew beards and all turned their thermostats down? What kind of a difference would it make?

Let’s do the math.

So I went to The Daily Green and there they claim that for each 1 degree you turn down the thermostat in the winter, you save between 1 and 3 percent on your heating costs. I have no idea how accurate this estimate is, but let's say 1%, just for fun.

So how much are heating costs? Using my house for example (a small house in southern Maine), between firewood and heating oil that's approximately 3 cords at $225@ and 500 gallons at $2.50@ . Which makes roughly $2000 a year.

So, if I turn my thermostat down 1 degree and save 1%, then I'd save 1% of $2000 or $20. Now let’s assume that money saved is a linear function of thermostat reduction. (Which it probably isn't, but we should be close enough for beard research.)

Now, suppose my beard allows me to turn my thermostat down only a half of a tenth of a degree. (And, again, I'm just making that up. If you have more accurate figures, please let me know.) So half of a tenth of degree will save half of a tenth of a percent on my heating bill. Which makes (1% x 1/10 x 1/2) x $2000 = .01 x .1 x .5 x $2000 = $1.

I will save $1 on my heating bill by growing a beard!

So a million men could save a collective $1 million on energy by growing beards. (Well, O.K., a million men living in small houses in southern Maine.) --WTP

(That's Jack Passion with the big red beard above. He is World Champion in the Full Beard division.) 

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--Bill Paarlberg is editor of  The Measurement Standard blog and newsletter, and of Katie Paine's new book Measure What Matters. The Measurement Standard is a publication of KDPaine & Partners, a company that delivers custom research to measure brand image, public relationships, and engagement.

 

Amazing Camouflage Octopus Video From Science Friday

OK, not even I could think up a reason why this has much to do with public relations measurement or social media measurement. But this video about cephalopod camouflage from NPR’s Science Friday is very, very amazing.

And, hey, the point at the end is that there is a whole lot of information out there that we can’t sense—or at least make sense of. So I guess this does have something to do with social media measurement, after all. --WTP

8 Brilliant Scientific Screw-Ups: mental_floss

Serendipity and bungling are the crazy uncle of invention. And the weird science of yesterday is the panty hose of today. Think about that next time your data gets sliced an odd way by accident and something turns up that looks very interesting. Don't be so quick to chuck it out.

As Eric Elfman says at mental_floss, “They say that patience is a virtue, but the following eight inventions prove that laziness, slovenliness, clumsiness and pure stupidity can be virtues, too.”

Includes:

#1. Anesthesia (1844)
Mistake Leading to Discovery: Recreational drug use
Lesson Learned: Too much of a good thing can sometimes be, well, a good thing

#5. Photography (1835)
Mistake Leading to Discovery: Not doing the dishes
Lesson Learned: Put off today what you can do tomorrow

#7. Nylon (1934)
Mistake Leading to Discovery: Workplace procrastination
Lesson Learned: When the cat’s away, the mice should play

Read the whole article at mental_floss.

(Thanks to New Scientist for the image of the Royal Mail stamp celebrating the discovery of penicillin.) --WTP

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Rene Descartes and the Soul of Public Relations Measurement

I this morning I sat down at the computer and the Word-of-the-Day was “ontology.” Then the first blog post I came across was ”Do Analytics Need a Soul?“ by Rachel Alt-Simmons over at the sascom voices blog. So naturally I started thinking about public relations measurement and what the heck it might possibly mean for it to have a soul.

Rachel’s post includes this provocative quote:

“We need a “soul” to make analytics successful. We recognize that a culture change is needed to move decision making from an art to a science, but we need the right balance of art and science. Our business will not be run by a computer – we need people with a feel for intuitive decision making that understands the business, but we need to give them tools to better inform their decision making process. How do we evolve this decision making process?”

Which applies very nicely to public relations measurement.

A Real-time Dashboard Public Relations Measurement People Can Only Dream About, So Far: The World Clock

If you haven't seen the World Clock, it's one of the most amazing examples of a real-time dashboard.