Internet Explorer Users Have Low Risk Intelligence 264
First time accepted submitter benne2011 writes "A hoax report earlier this year claimed that people who used Internet Explorer had a lower IQ than those using other browsers. Inspired by this bit of fun, Projection Point decided to carry out a real study comparing the risk intelligence (RQ) of people using different browsers. We found that Internet Explorer users performed worse than everyone else; they had lower RQ scores and were grossly overconfident."
This is serious Confirmation (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Salt in the wound? (Score:5, Insightful)
Where's the test? (Score:5, Insightful)
This study would be a lot more believable if they didn't use phrases like " users of monopoly software" and actually linked to the test they gave.
(For the record, I'm not an IE user either. But the article isn't too far from spelling Microsoft with a dollar sign)
Not fair. (Score:5, Insightful)
Uh, (Score:0, Insightful)
there's no such thing as "risk intelligence". It's a fucking made-up word by the idiot blogger in TFA. Go ahead, TRY to look it up.
Re:Where's the test? (Score:4, Insightful)
This study would be a lot more believable if they didn't use phrases like " users of monopoly software" and actually linked to the test they gave.
(For the record, I'm not an IE user either. But the article isn't too far from spelling Microsoft with a dollar sign)
And perhaps they could give the error margins for their results. I'd put money on the error margin being a lot bigger than differences in the user group results.
Is this a case of hoax 2.0 (a hoax of a hoax)? (Score:5, Insightful)
From their website: "We define Risk Intelligence as the ability to estimate probabilities accurately."
Are they not aware of the pioneering and Nobel prize awarded studies of Tversky and Kahnemann in the 70's which demonstrated beyond any doubt that humans are terrible at estimating any kind of probability (especially risk-related ones)?
What about the 10-step percentage scale they used? Seriously, is any person able to differentiate between being "70% sure" and "80% sure" regarding any statement?
What about latent variables like the OS used? How can one possibly compare any feature of a Windows user with features of Mac or Linux user?
I can't locate any samples of the questionnaire used and I don't need to see any, because I'm 89.345943% sure they don't know what they're talking about.
Re:Where's the test? (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not a study. It's an online poll. The participants self-selected
Re:{Shudder} (Score:3, Insightful)
Watching is OK ... its believing that can get you in trouble.
Re:{Shudder} (Score:3, Insightful)
I think it'd be more of an issue for the masses that watch MSNBC, or listen to NPR.
Re:No proof (Score:2, Insightful)
A sample size of 351 and the scores are 57.5, 59.8, 60.2, and 61.8. That proves what exactly?
The margin of error is +/- 5%
Re:Please no... (Score:2, Insightful)
Should I get her on to Chromium instead?
It is enough to get her stop using yahoo.
Re:Please no... (Score:4, Insightful)
Dewey Defeated Truman when the pollsters only pulled people in country clubs. The math was correct... The sample size was good, the problem was the sample wasn't random enough.
Or pull questions that can be used to direct people into answering the questions in a particular way."Do you believe that a mother has the right to kill her own baby?" or "Do you think the woman has the right to choose how to live their life?"
Am I the only one who is quite frustrated by the abuse of Math in modern society, where numbers and percentages are spat out without giving us the data to make recheck the decision ourselves and evaluate the data. I mean we have protests and people getting arrested and some hurt and killed over their particular summarized summary of the data. Those 99%ers vs the 53%ers. Where everyone thinks they are the majority because the numbers that have been manipulated shows them to be right.
Give us the raw data. Let us see and and peer check it ourselves see if we come with the same conclusion. I much rather be wrong and know the truth then think I am right and live a lie... But I may be the minority on that, I didn't collect any data on that.
Re:Please no... (Score:5, Insightful)
If she is using NoScript in a "medium" security manner -- meaning temporarily trust the parent domain of the site, but only whitelist external scripts (which means a fair amount of clicking "Temp allow akami / googleapis / disqus / some-image-service / etc") then that is MUCH better than Chome. Even NoScript in a "low" security method that temp-allows all scripts on a page but still blocks XSS, ClearClick, and anything else you choose like Java applets and iframes is still better than allowing all javascript and all plugins.
On the privacy front, try BetterPrivacy (never touch it after first time config) to flush all local Flash storage on browser start+stop. (You can of course whitelist LSOs from your bank or whatever.) Additionally, try CookieMonster in whitelist-only mode. It's just like NoScript, but for cookies so you can permanently allow all the sites she logs into, and temp allow any random page with a form.
Even just trying some extra plugins or stronger security settings will help everyone think more about security as they're learning more about security.