Communicating statistical information is hard. In fact, I would argue that it’s harder than communicating empirical science — and in some ways a fundamentally different beast. For inspiration, then, we can look beyond the typical advice given to scientists who need to communicate their work to a broader audience. In this talk I’ll discuss how a human-centered approach can help us create a type of communication that’s uniquely suited to data and statistics. In this approach the quantitative information is shaped to fit our blundering human brain and linguistic structures — not the other way around.

About the Speaker:

Dr. Nuzzo is a Senior Advisor for Statistics Communication and Media Innovation at the American Statistical Association and an adjunct professor for Virginia Tech in the National Capital Region. She helps statisticians and data scientists work on their communication skills and helps journalists gain more experience with statistics and data. She was previously a Professor in the Department of Science, Mathematics & Technology at Gallaudet University, where she taught statistics to undergraduate and graduate students.

Dr. Nuzzo also writes about statistics, data, health, medicine, and science for a variety of audiences and publications, including Scientific American, New Scientist, Science News, Nature, Reader’s Digest, Knowable Magazine, ESPN Magazine, Los Angeles Times, and the New York Times.