This cartoon caption can be used to discuss the difference between one- and two-sided tests (and why the gym in the cartoon might choose the former). The cartoon was used in the June 2025 CAUSE cartoon caption contest and the winning caption was written by Steve Wang from Swarthmore College. The cartoon was drawn by British cartoonist John Landers (www.landers.co.uk) based on an idea by Dennis Pearl from Penn State University.
This cartoon caption can be used to discuss how the interpretation of data must be informed by a knowledge of the how the data was generated. The cartoon was used in the May 2025 CAUSE cartoon caption contest and the winning caption was written by Sara Colando, a student at Carnegie Mellon University. The cartoon was drawn by British cartoonist John Landers (www.landers.co.uk) based on an idea by Dennis Pearl from Penn State University.
This cartoon caption can be used to discuss concepts about the probability of the intersection of two events. The cartoon was used in the April 2025 CAUSE cartoon caption contest and the winning caption was written by Cigdem Sirin from The University of Texas at El Paso. The cartoon was drawn by British cartoonist John Landers (www.landers.co.uk) based on an idea by Dennis Pearl from Penn State University.
This cartoon caption can be used to illustrate the idea that over-cleaning or over-smoothing messy data may risk the loss of important information and yield a misleading characterization of the data. The cartoon was used in the March 2025 CAUSE cartoon caption contest and the winning caption was written by Jerry Nedelman from the TB Alliance. The cartoon was drawn by British cartoonist John Landers (www.landers.co.uk) based on an idea by Dennis Pearl from Penn State University.
This cartoon caption can be used to illustrate the difference between continuous and discrete distributions. The cartoon was used in the February 2025 CAUSE cartoon caption contest and the winning caption was written by retired AP Statistics teacher Jodene Kissler. The cartoon was drawn by British cartoonist John Landers (www.landers.co.uk) based on an idea by Dennis Pearl from Penn State University.
This cartoon caption can be used to illustrate the idea that no matter how sound the technical analysis is, if the client can't understand it, they won't use it. The cartoon was used in the January 2025 CAUSE cartoon caption contest and the winning caption was written by Jim Alloway from EMSQ Associates. The cartoon was drawn by British cartoonist John Landers (www.landers.co.uk) based on an idea by Dennis Pearl from Penn State University.
This cartoon caption can be used in discussing how modern tools in data science have precursors in the Exploratory Data Analysis techniques developed by John Tukey who famously described the interdisciplinary nature of statistics with his quote "The best thing about being a statistician is that you get to play in everyone's backyard." The cartoon was used in the December 2024 CAUSE cartoon caption contest and the winning caption was written by Larry Lesser from The University of Texas at El Paso. (Lesser was then sparked by the Tukey quote to write his song “Backyard” that won 3rd place in the 2025 A-mu-sing contest.) The cartoon was drawn by British cartoonist John Landers (www.landers.co.uk) based on an idea by Dennis Pearl from Penn State University.
This cartoon caption can be used in discussing how modern tools in data science might help with drawing inferences from data gathered by nontraditional means. The cartoon was used in the November 2024 CAUSE cartoon caption contest and the winning caption was written by Jim Brumbaugh-Smith from Manchester University. The cartoon was drawn by British cartoonist John Landers (www.landers.co.uk) based on an idea by Dennis Pearl from Penn State University.
This cartoon caption can be used in discussing how simple random sampling can be improved upon by taking obvious explanatory factors into account. The cartoon was used in the October 2024 CAUSE cartoon caption contest and the winning caption was written by high school student Jackson Lin, from North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics. The cartoon was drawn by British cartoonist John Landers (www.landers.co.uk) based on an idea by Dennis Pearl from Penn State University.
This cartoon caption can be used in a conversation about the least squares method for estimation in the regression setting. The cartoon was used as one of two cartoons in the September 2024 CAUSE cartoon caption contest and the winning caption was written by Nate Josephs from North Carolina State University. The cartoon was drawn by British cartoonist John Landers (www.landers.co.uk) based on an idea by Dennis Pearl from Penn State University.