| Index | Last Week | Contact DQ News | Latest Issue |
| Featured Articles | Data & Information | Science & Technology | Education |
| Economics | Business | Law | Medicine |
2000 Census and Sampling: Lose/Lose Situation?
Two articles in The New York Times and The Washington Post on August 30th discussed plans for the 2000 Census, as well as problems that occurred with previous American decennial censuses. It appears that both the political stakes in the next census and the disappointment in the undercounts of the 1970, 1980, and 1990 censuses will cause a major political conflict during and after the 2000 census.
According to an August 30th article in the Post, the political interest in decennial censuses started in 1970, after the U.S. Supreme Court decided in the early 1960's that legislative districts must be equal in population to ensure equal representation. Also, federal grants and aid were increasingly awarded on the basis of population. So, both political power and money depended on census data. (Obviously, politicians correlate voting data and census data.) As the results of decennial undercounts and overcounts in various areas were reported by the Census Bureau, politicians in the areas that were undercounted became increasingly unhappy, and demanded remedies. Unfortunately, counting people in hard-to-enumerate areas is difficult and expensive. This led the Census Bureau to try various sampling strategies, starting with the 1970 census. When the undercounts persisted, the Bureau tried different adjustment and sampling strategies. The undercount (and overcount) still persisted, leading the Bureau to devise post-enumeration sampling strategies. Therefore, after three decennial censuses, there is mistrust of both traditional census enumeration and sample-and-adjust strategies.
The Times article points out that American census-taking has always been error-prone. In 1970, the Census Bureau started mailing census questionnaires, taking for granted that (for example) the two "people" listed on a questionnaire for a household weren't really a person and a cat. Moreover, the percentage of households that have mailed back a decennial census questionnaire has been steadily decreasing, leading to more errors when census enumerators try to contact such households to obtain information about who lived there on April 1st. For these and other reasons, the 2000 census will be the last time the Bureau uses "long form" questionnaires to collect a sample of detailed household information. In the future, there will be a large national household survey to collect such information yearly.
The Post article appears on page C2, and was written by Michael Teitelbaum and Jay Winter. The Times article appears on page 14, and was written by Peter T. Kilborn.
'Study' Claims Internet is Depressing
A front page New York Times report on August 30th discusses a recently-completed study of Internet users by researchers at Carnegie-Mellon University. The study, which cost $1.5 million and was funded by several technology companies and the National Science Foundation, found that people who spend even a few hours a week on line experience higher levels of loneliness and depression than if they scarcely used the Internet.
Based on the data, the researchers hypothesize that relationships maintained over long distances ultimately do not contribute to a sense of psychological security and happiness compared to relationships based upon face-to-face contact. The study tracked the behavior of 169 participants in the Pittsburgh area who were selected from four schools and community groups. Half the group was measured through two years of Internet use, and the other half for one year. The findings have been published by The American Psychologist, the peer-reviewed monthly journal of the American Psychological Association.
According to the Times and The American Psychologist, the study subjects weren't randomly selected. Nor was there a control group. The researchers didn't try to determine whether people who were already goegraphically isolated might have benefited from communicating via the Internet. The article was written by Amy Harmon.
WSJ: Most Small Business Advice is Worthless
An analysis published in the September 1st issue of The Wall Street Journal concerns advice that is offered - both voluntary and paid - from a wide range of sources: attorneys, accountants, consultants, associations, panels, magazines and other publications, and other sources.
According to the Journal, small businesses need to be aware that people and organizations that offer small businesses advice often have conflicts of interest. Small business are constantly bombarded by faxes and spam e-mail offering business advice. The Journal recommends that the owners of small businesses receiving such "advice" ask themselves: who is going to benefit most from the advice? Unfortunately, attorneys and accountants often provide bad advice because most of them are generalists who are often not familiar with their clients' line of business.
The Journal advises small business owners to check and re-check any and all advice from so-called "experts" and people who serve on industry/organization panels. The report was written by Journal staff reporter Jefferey Tannenbaum, and appears on page B2.
Successful Web Searches Require Right Search Engine
A September 3rd article in The New York Times explains why there is a big difference in the results of web searches among various search engines, and how to take best advantage of the different types of "engines."
According to the Times, Web users who attempt searches run into problems for three reasons: each search engine works differently than other search engines, the way search engines work is not generally understood and search sites don't generally do a good job explaining how they work, and Web searchers often don't bother to learn to use the right search tools and the right search engine to efficiently obtain information.
There are three types of search "engines" or sites. The first type (e.g., Yahoo) aren't really search engines but a Web directory, compiled by humans who classify Web sites under headings. The second type are the engines (e.g., Hotbot, Alta Vista, and Infoseek) which use software agents called crawlers or spiders to index the contents of individual Web pages, then follow the links to other pages. A third type of search site that includes popular sites like Metacrawler and Metafind - often called metasearch tools - don't maintain any index of their own but issue search requests to a number of other Web search sites. When Hotbot, AltaVista, etc., return their results, the metasearch site collects them onto a single Web page for display.
Simply picking one type of search site and conducting a search is no guarantee of good results. Internet search experts suggest that learning how to use Boolean operators (and, or, not), learning how to string words and phrases together to get better results, using specialized search tools, abandoning a search when relevant information isn't displayed in a page or two, and learning about the capabilities of search sites and engines can make searches much more efficient and rewarding. The Times article gives a thumbnail evaluation of several different seach sites, and ways to obtain more information. The article was written by Matt Lake.
[Editor's Note: This article can provide valuable information for those who lack experience in conducting Web searches]