When someone spews some statistics in your face your automatic response should be, “Says who?” “How do you know that for sure?” Think about what you may be missing in the translation or what may be missing in the statistics themselves even if they are accurately being portrayed to you. What are you NOT being told?
The data and its results SOUND reasonable, but compared to what? The lack or absence of data or what you do NOT know weakens the credibility of any statistics being presented to you as evidence or facts. So you have to ask the questions OR you just rollover and believe the statistics others use to try and convince or persuade you.
When deciphering the art of persuasive speech and speaking, in any argument or debate, you have to be aware that the subject at hand may be changed somewhere in mid-stream during the argument, consequently misleading you if you are not attentive and aware of deceptive persuasive tactics. This is inherent in most TV news and public affairs shows.
Even in TV news stories, especially those dealing with anything political, most everything is ALWAYS taken out of context from what the source really said or meant because every newscaster, reporter and journalist and everyone else on the planet has an unconscious, subjective, hidden political agenda no matter if they admit it or not.
Sometimes a statistic or conclusion from some study, no matter how credible the source is, can be reported as if it means something else entirely from what it really may mean. Always ask, “Does the proposition make sense to me?” Many statistics are just used to plain LIE. The magic of numbers strung together in mass may “fog up” your common sense.
Remember, when you are speaking with numbers it always sounds more convincing to talk in specifics rather than generalities. For example, it is more convincing to say, “33.56% of the people surveyed believe….” instead of saying, “Around 33% of the people surveyed believe…”. Statistics lie and liars use statistics.