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From: cheryl@batcomputer.TN.CORNELL.EDU (cheryl)
Newsgroups: soc.misc,soc.women
Subject: Re: Team Sports, an observation
Message-ID: <1079@batcomputer.TN.CORNELL.EDU>
Date: Tue, 23-Sep-86 13:21:59 EDT
Article-I.D.: batcompu.1079
Posted: Tue Sep 23 13:21:59 1986
Date-Received: Thu, 25-Sep-86 05:47:42 EDT
References: <1127@mit-trillian.MIT.EDU> <3357@umcp-cs.UUCP>
Reply-To: cheryl@batcomputer.UUCP (cheryl)
Organization: Theory Center, Cornell University, Ithaca NY
Lines: 39
Xref: linus soc.misc:9 soc.women:53

In article <1075@kontron.UUCP> cramer@kontron.UUCP (Clayton Cramer) writes:
>> In article <5987@lll-crg.ARpA> figmo@lll-crg.UUCP (Lynn Gold) writes:
>> >
>> >I was a lousy athlete up to high school -- NON-athlete is a more
>> >accurate representation.  When I transferred to a small, private
>> >school for high school, there was a much stronger push for EVERYONE to
>> >get involved with athletics because when your school is THAT small,
>> >you NEED warm bodies just to fill up a team.  Surprisingly, though,
>> >our school fielded some damn good teams.  Since the headmaster had 5
>> >or 6 daughters who were all outstanding athletes, there was a strong
>> >girls' sports program.
>> 
>> A study of Bryn Mawr alumnae  indicated that women who were on
>> athletic teams in college were HALF as likely to develop breast
>> cancer than women who were not athletes.  Needing warm bodies
>> is right.  They're a heck of a lot more lively than cold bodies,
>> which is what you're likely to wind up with if you develop breast
>> cancer.
>> 
>
>Does this indicate that athletic women are less likely to develop
>breast cancer?  Or is there some more subtle cause of this statistic?

Does all of the statistical correlation between smoking and incidence
of lung cancer indicate that people who smoke are more likely to get
lung cancer?  Or is there some more subtle cause of this statistic?

>What efforts were made to control for other differences between the
>athletes and non-athletes?  

They also studied marital status, age, number of children and diet.
None of these correlated as strongly as involvement in athletics.

>Raw statistics are the least useful numbers in the known universe.
>That must be why Cheryl likes 'em so much.  Clayton E. Cramer


Clayton, if you ever need any help pulling your head out of your ass, 
don't come crying to me.