← Methods · Part 5 of 6
What we will not claim
We will say
- This is what the data shows, and here is the size of it
- This is observed behavior; that is stated preference
- These two things moved together, and here is what else was happening
- We do not have enough here to answer that yet, and this is what it would take
- Our earlier recommendation was wrong, and here is the number that changed it
We will not say
- That correlation is causation because the client would prefer it
- That a test reached significance when the sample cannot carry it
- That a rise was ours when three other things changed the same month
- That a method is appropriate because it is the one we happen to own
- That a finding is settled when it is a hypothesis worth testing
Findings do not get edited on the way to the client. Independence is the whole reason an outside assessment is worth anything, and if a finding gets softened it stops being useful to anybody.
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