Allen, J.C., Goodwill, A.M., Watters, K., & Beauregard, E. (2014). Base rates and Bayes’ Theorem for decision support. Policing: An International Journal of Police Strategies & Management, 37(1), 159-169.
My research is in quantitative methods and contextualized decision making. This includes application of Bayesian methods in Forensic Psychology. My primary interest is in prediction and what can make psychological science more predictively useful. We are moving from a modal practice of following recipes and conditioning on cut-off rules (e.g., Cis without zeroes, ps <.05) to more demanding, mindful, and less false-positive-prone approaches that condition conclusions more on data, context, and performance (e.g., justifying alphas and priors, considering their ranges, reporting a wider variety of analyses). Will this help us better predict things like behaviour and the success of social policy interventions? We are also beginning to encounter Big Data, which offers many opportunities for convergent research and many new challenges and cautions. Will this provide an explosion of insights or of misinterpreted noise? It is an exciting time to be a “quant” in psychology.