QPRC 2016

Cautions about the Use of Bayesian Approaches
for the Design and Analysis of Experiments

Geoff Vining
Virginia Tech

Bayesian approaches are increasingly popular within the statistics community.  However, they currently do not seem to find wide application within the industrial statistics/quality improvement community.  This talk examines some of the basic reasons why.

This talk begins by reviewing the importance of the scientific method within quality improvement.  It also discusses Deming’s concepts of analytic versus enumerative studies.  Together, these concepts provide a framework for evaluating when Bayesian approaches make good sense, where they make little sense, and where they fall somewhere in between.  This paper examines in some detail both the impact on the planning of the experiment and its analysis.