The Clever Hans effect, and Manson ASL
Feb. 20th, 2011 11:08 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lederhosenArticle in the Economist about the 'Clever Hans' effect in sniffer dogs:
When handlers could see a red piece of paper, allegedly marking a location of interest, they were much more likely to say that their dogs signalled an alert. Indeed, in the two rooms where red paper was present and sausages were not, 32 of a possible 36 alerts were raised. In the two where both red paper and sausages were present that figure was 30–not significantly different. In contrast, in search areas where a sausage was hidden but no red piece of paper was there for handlers to see, it was only 17.
The dogs, in other words, were distracted only about half the time by the stimulus aimed at them. The human handlers were not only distracted on almost every occasion by the stimulus aimed at them, but also transmitted that distraction to their animals–who responded accordingly.
Also, this video is rather nifty. I'm not a huge fan of Manson (he has some OK songs, the shock-your-parents marketing gets a little wearying) but this guy has really made an effort. (Audio NSFW, but you can watch with the sound turned off.)
(Embedding seems to be misbehaving, so replaced the embed with a link.)
When handlers could see a red piece of paper, allegedly marking a location of interest, they were much more likely to say that their dogs signalled an alert. Indeed, in the two rooms where red paper was present and sausages were not, 32 of a possible 36 alerts were raised. In the two where both red paper and sausages were present that figure was 30–not significantly different. In contrast, in search areas where a sausage was hidden but no red piece of paper was there for handlers to see, it was only 17.
The dogs, in other words, were distracted only about half the time by the stimulus aimed at them. The human handlers were not only distracted on almost every occasion by the stimulus aimed at them, but also transmitted that distraction to their animals–who responded accordingly.
Also, this video is rather nifty. I'm not a huge fan of Manson (he has some OK songs, the shock-your-parents marketing gets a little wearying) but this guy has really made an effort. (Audio NSFW, but you can watch with the sound turned off.)
(Embedding seems to be misbehaving, so replaced the embed with a link.)
no subject
Date: 2011-02-20 02:29 pm (UTC)Clever Hans reference and observer bias skewing results. Sweet! 8^)
no subject
Date: 2011-02-20 11:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-20 03:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-20 07:18 pm (UTC)First of May (Jonathon Coulton)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gEjRHFom1Kk
Re: Your Brains (Jonathon Coulton)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQYjZc7gKXc
I Had a Shoggoth (Tom Smith)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LecGuQE6t44
no subject
Date: 2011-02-20 07:18 pm (UTC)