News and announcements

Steve Simon

2010-08-31

This page is obsolete, but is being kept around anyway.

August

2010-08-31. Sign up for “The Monthly Mean,” the newsletter that dares to call itself average (sign up link no longer active).

July

2010-07-16. News: “Data entry and data management issues with examples in IBM SPSS,” Tuesday, August 24, 11am-noon CDT. Free webinar open to everyone. Details at (sign up link no longer active).

June

2010-06-17. “Linear regression” July 14, 11AM CDT, “Logistic regression” July 15, 11AM CDT. Both webinars are free! Details at (sign up link no longer active).

May

2010-05-26. What do all these numbers mean? Sensitivity, specificity, and likelihood ratios. Free to all! Thursday, June 10, 11am-noon, CDT. Abstract: This one hour training class will give you a general introduction to numeric summary measures for diagnostic testing. You will learn how to distinguish between a diagnostic test that is useful for ruling in a diagnosis and one that is useful for ruling out a diagnosis. You will also see an illustration of how prevalence of disease affects the performance of a diagnostic test. Please have a pocket calculator available during this presentation. This class is useful for anyone who reads journal articles that evaluate these tests. I will post a handout for this class at least 24 hours prior to the webinar. General information about the webinar series is at (sign up link no longer active).

2010-05-04. The first three steps in a linear regression analysis with examples in IBM SPSS. Free webinar, open to all! Wednesday, May 26, 11am-noon, CDT. Abstract: This class will give you a general introduction in how to use SPSS software to compute linear regression models. Linear regression models provide a good way to examine how various factors influence a continuous outcome measure. There are three steps in a typical linear regression analysis: fit a crude model, fit an adjusted model, and check your assumptions These steps may not be appropriate for every linear regression analysis, but they do serve as a general guideline. In this class you will learn how to: interpret the slope and intercept in a linear regression model; compute a simple linear regression model; and make statistical adjustments for covariates. No statistical experience is necessary (explain). No special hardware/software is needed (explain). I will post a handout for this class at least 24 hours prior to the webinar. General information about the webinar series is at (sign up link no longer active).

April

March

February

2010-02-23. Free webinar: Putting it all together: meta-analyses and systematic overviews. Wednesday, March 31, 11am-noon, CST. Abstract: This class helps you assess the quality of a systematic overview or meta-analysis. In this class you will learn how to: recognize sources of heterogeneity in meta-analysis; identify and avoid problems with publication bias; and explain the ethical concerns with failure to publish and with duplicate publication. No statistical experience is necessary (explain). No special hardware/software is needed (explain). I will post a handout for this class at least 24 hours prior to the webinar. General information about the webinar series is at (sign up link no longer active).

January

2010-01-27. Free webinar: “What do all these numbers mean? Sensitivity, specificity, and likelihood ratios,” February 17, 11am-noon, CST. Abstract: This one hour training class will give you a general introduction to numeric summary measures for diagnostic testing. You will learn how to distinguish between a diagnostic test that is useful for ruling in a diagnosis and one that is useful for ruling out a diagnosis. You will also see an illustration of how prevalence of disease affects the performance of a diagnostic test. Please have a pocket calculator available during this presentation. This class is useful for anyone who reads journal articles that evaluate these tests. No statistical experience is necessary (explain). No special hardware/software is needed (explain). General information about the webinar series is at (sign up link no longer active).

2010-01-06. Free webinar: “The first three steps in a descriptive data analysis”, Thursday, January 21, 2010, 11am-noon, CST. Abstract: This one hour training class will give you a general introduction to descriptive data analysis using PASW (formerly known as SPSS) software. The first three steps in a descriptive data analysis are: (1) know how much dat you have and how much data is missing; (2) compute ranges or frequencies for individual variables; and (3) compute crosstabs, boxplots, or scatterplots to examine relationships among pairs of variables. This class is useful for anyone who needs to analyze research data. No statistical experience is necessary (explain). No special hardware/software is needed (explain). To register, send an email to with the words “January 21 webinar” in the subject line. A draft handout is available. The final handout is available, one slide per page or six slides per page. General information about the webinar series is at (sign up link no longer active).

You can find an earlier version of this page on my website.