IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/osf/osfxxx/8usxn.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Stop Splitting Hairs: The Problems with Dichotomizing Continuous Data in Language Research

Author

Listed:
  • Hemelstrand, Shawn
  • Inoue, Tomohiro

Abstract

It is common in the language sciences to dichotomize continuous data in order to fit this data to statistical tests. However, several statisticians and methodologists have warned against this practice for years. Many in the language sciences seem unaware of this problem. Because of the lack of modern, robust, and open data simulations related to this issue in the language science literature, our paper provides an empirical investigation of this practice. Across six different simulations, our analysis shows that dichotomization almost universally increases the standard errors, and consequently leads to inaccuracy of tests of statistical significance. Furthermore, effect sizes like are often diminished by the reduction of available information in the data. Our paper concludes by providing suggestions and considerations for future empirical studies.

Suggested Citation

  • Hemelstrand, Shawn & Inoue, Tomohiro, 2025. "Stop Splitting Hairs: The Problems with Dichotomizing Continuous Data in Language Research," OSF Preprints 8usxn, Center for Open Science.
    • Handle: RePEc:osf:osfxxx:8usxn
    DOI: 10.31219/osf.io/8usxn
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://osf.io/download/678660fca4385e6cd3e241ae/
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.31219/osf.io/8usxn?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:osf:osfxxx:8usxn. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: OSF (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://osf.io/preprints/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.