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Table 1 The table shows separately for analyses of hawk-dove differences, male–female differences, White-nonWhite differences, and differences between odd and even numbered candidates (see columns), the numbers of examiners who reached statistical significance (rows) on various criteria

From: Investigating possible ethnicity and sex bias in clinical examiners: an analysis of data from the MRCP(UK) PACES and nPACES examinations

 

Hawk-Dove

Male–female

White-NonWhite

Odd-Even numbering

 

Positive: Examiner hawkish

Positive: Males score higher than females

Positive: Whites score higher than non-Whites

  
 

PACES

nPACES

PACES

nPACES

PACES

nPACES

PACES

nPACES

Negative effect: P < .05 corrected

34 (1.9%)

35 (2.3%)

0

0

2 (0.1%)

1 (0.1%)

0

0

Negative effect: P < .05 uncorrected (chance expectation = 2.5%)

198 (11.1%)

235 (15.7%)

73 (4.1%)

63 (4.2%)

73 (4.4%)

48 (3.6%)

60 (3.2%)

51 (3.2%)

Not significant (uncorrected, p > .05)

1339 (74.8%)

989 (66.0%)

1638 (91.5%)

1379 (92.1%)

1491 (90.4%)

1229 (92.2%)

1680 (93.9%)

1396 (93.2%)

Positive effect: P < .05 uncorrected (chance expectation = 2.5%)

192 (10.7%)

200 (13.4%)

79 (4.4%)

55 (3.7%)

82 (5.0%)

55 (4.1%)

50 (3.0%)

51 (3.6%)

Positive effect: P < .05 corrected

27 (1.5%)

39 (2.6%)

0

0

1 (0.1%)

0

0

0

N examiners

1790

1498

1790

1497

1649

1333

1790

1498

  1. Levels of statistical significance are divided into five groups, those who are significant at a Bonferroni corrected level of p < .05 (first and fifth rows), those who are significant at a non-Bonferroni-corrected level of p < .05 (second and fourth rows), and those who are not significant at a non-Bonferroni-corrected level of p < .05 (middle row). ‘Positive’ refers., arbitrarily, to examiners being more hawkish (i.e. giving lower overall scores), giving higher scores to male candidates, giving higher scores to White candidates, or giving higher scores to odd-numbered candidates. By chance alone one would expect 95% of candidates to be in the ‘non-significant’ group, with the remaining 5% of candidates distributed evenly between negative and positive effects.