Nonsense correlations in neuroscience
Many statistical methods commonly used in neuroscience are invalid, and can lead to incorrect conclusions inferred with high levels of statistical significance. This is because traditional methods assume independence of samples, which is not the case for neurophysiological signals with slow continuous trends over time. I will discuss how to spot this problem of “nonsense correlations”, and describe a suite of statistical tests that can be validly used with slowly-drifting neurophysiological data. I will also discuss how to design behavioral paradigms that allow a wider range of valid tests for analysis of brain recordings.
Date: 6 February 2025, 16:00
Venue: Sherrington Building, off Parks Road OX1 3PT
Venue Details: Blakemore Lecture Theatre, DPAG
Speaker: Kenneth Harris (University College London)
Organiser: Sasha Tinelli (University of Oxford)
Organiser contact email address: sasha.tinelli@chch.ox.ac.uk
Host: Sasha Tinelli (University of Oxford)
Booking required?: Not required
Audience: Public
Editor: Sasha Tinelli