3 ms·

Consider two children, Alice and Bob, who appear equal on objective measurements while applying to college. Alice comes from an environment that heavily values

Consider two children, Alice and Bob, who appear equal on objective measurements while applying to college. Alice comes from an environment that heavily values education; Bob comes from one that does not. Despite this, they both achieved equal academic results. Further, if admitted, they will both find themselves in the same education valuing environment (college). Since Bob came from an environment that did not value education, we might expect to see an improvement from the mere fact that he is now in an environment that does value education. In contrast, since Alice already came from such an environment, we would see no such improvement (from that cause).

glangdale 8y ago
This assumes that the sum total of Alice and Bob's ability to perform in higher education is measurable by their admissions portfolio. I can picture many different things matching this overall impression. Perhaps Alice is the child of two university professors and has vaguely drifted to near-perfect scores without really having to work. Alternately, she has slaved over her books desperate to please her parents and is at the end of her rope. Similarly, Bob might be a self-educated polymath who has transcended his background, or a crammer who has carefully done everything exactly right to produce the highest score possible, but is almost entirely uneducated outside of the areas that produced good-looking admissions.
- gizmo686 8y ago
  Yes. In reality, we are talking about populations. It is still possible that the type of confounded you describe applies at the population level as well, which is why I qualified my statement with "might expect". This is an empirical question that requires empirical evidence to answer. Further, universities have this empirical evidence (although I am not aware of what it actually says). I do recall hearing that (at some point in history) the army looked into this and found that black soldiers did better then their white counterparts with an equal score entering. Further, this is presisly the result I would expect to see in the face of generic anti-black bias. For instance, if there was some force that depressed black SAT scores by 10 points and had no other effect, then a black student would be expected to perform as well as a white student who scored 10 points better on the SAT.
brighteyes 8y ago
Sure, if they are equal on all objective measurements, your theory may be valid. But Asian-American students etc. have far better objective measurements than other groups, on average. So if you just break ties, as you suggest, you're not going to move the needle much.
- gizmo686 8y ago
  I was looking at the marginal case because it is the easiest to see. Once you accept that this is the case (which, as I pointed out in another comment is an empirical question; it is not a-priori obvious that I am correct), the question becomes how big is the effect. If it is sufficiently large, then it would be sufficient to overcome significant differences in objective measurements. Again, this is an empirical question.

glangdale 8y ago

This assumes that the sum total of Alice and Bob's ability to perform in higher education is measurable by their admissions portfolio. I can picture many different things matching this overall impression. Perhaps Alice is the child of two university professors and has vaguely drifted to near-perfect scores without really having to work. Alternately, she has slaved over her books desperate to please her parents and is at the end of her rope. Similarly, Bob might be a self-educated polymath who has transcended his background, or a crammer who has carefully done everything exactly right to produce the highest score possible, but is almost entirely uneducated outside of the areas that produced good-looking admissions.

gizmo686 8y ago
Yes. In reality, we are talking about populations. It is still possible that the type of confounded you describe applies at the population level as well, which is why I qualified my statement with "might expect". This is an empirical question that requires empirical evidence to answer. Further, universities have this empirical evidence (although I am not aware of what it actually says). I do recall hearing that (at some point in history) the army looked into this and found that black soldiers did better then their white counterparts with an equal score entering. Further, this is presisly the result I would expect to see in the face of generic anti-black bias. For instance, if there was some force that depressed black SAT scores by 10 points and had no other effect, then a black student would be expected to perform as well as a white student who scored 10 points better on the SAT.

brighteyes 8y ago

Sure, if they are equal on all objective measurements, your theory may be valid. But Asian-American students etc. have far better objective measurements than other groups, on average. So if you just break ties, as you suggest, you're not going to move the needle much.

gizmo686 8y ago
I was looking at the marginal case because it is the easiest to see. Once you accept that this is the case (which, as I pointed out in another comment is an empirical question; it is not a-priori obvious that I am correct), the question becomes how big is the effect. If it is sufficiently large, then it would be sufficient to overcome significant differences in objective measurements. Again, this is an empirical question.