Educational Technology
I was presenting Intellectus Statistics to an international educational marketer recently who asked about the interpretation, “shouldn’t students write it themselves?” he asked. My first response is “sure, don’t use the interpretation, just the raw output.” Then I kind of scratch my head and think, “how is the current mode of learning statistics working for all of those undergrads, masters, and professional degrees?” At the doctorate level, the answer is not very well. Through the years I’ve noticed a trend of “dumbing down” of statistics (to descriptive or qualitative) in many doctoral level studies, and for undergrads and master’s levels, even worse. Houston, we have a problem! Intellectus is a response to this problem.
Intellectus is ideally suited to two primary populations: students learning statistics and those needing a results chapter draft. For students, that use Intellectus Statistics, the application does three things no other software does. First, it teaches students what assumptions should go into the analyses. Second, it confirms students are accurately interpreting the assumptions, analyses, and post-hoc tests. The immediate validation of their thinking, lowers anxiety, and builds confidence. Third, it teaches students how to report statistical output in a scholarly fashion and how to present in APA style. Statistics instructors have said it saves them office hour time and students are not bogged down by learning a particular stats program—then having to learn how to interpret that specific program’s output to properly report their findings.
The second population Intellectus is ideally suited for are those needing a results chapter draft. Dissertations, theses, poster presentations, and faculty, all appreciate the ability to generate a draft in seconds rather than hours and weeks. The application is a great time saver that allows users to spend more time thinking about the theoretical and practical implications of their findings, rather than trudging through the formatting process.
There’s another benefit—the cost. Intellectus is often half the price of legacy software. Given the cost of the application, interpreted output in APA style, glossary of terms and symbols, and raw output, the value is clear. Why use Intellectus Statistics? The real question you should be asking yourself is why not!