Inductive inference or inductive behavior: Fisher and Neyman-Pearson approaches to statistical testing in psychological research (1940-1960)

Am J Psychol. 2006 Winter;119(4):625-53.

Abstract

The application of statistical testing in psychological research over the period of 1940-1960 is examined in order to address psychologists' reconciliation of the extant controversy between the Fisher and Neyman-Pearson approaches. Textbooks of psychological statistics and the psychological journal literature are reviewed to examine the presence of what Gigerenzer (1993) called a hybrid model of statistical testing. Such a model is present in the textbooks, although the mathematically incomplete character of this model precludes the appearance of a similarly hybridized approach to statistical testing in the research literature. The implications of this hybrid model for psychological research and the statistical testing controversy are discussed.

Publication types

  • Historical Article
  • Review

MeSH terms

  • History, 20th Century
  • Humans
  • Psychological Tests
  • Psychology / history*
  • Statistics as Topic / history*