ABSTRACT
It has been said that “bad statistics are harder to kill than a vam-pire” (Best, 2008). at is, it is incredibly hard to “kill” a popular belief even when there is little or no evidence to support it-or even when the bulk of the evidence contradicts it. Unfortunately social science research and statistics can be misused or misinterpreted in ways that lead to false beliefs and damaging stereotypes. But once these beliefs and stereotypes take hold, regardless of their inaccuracy, they become self-perpetuating. A stereotype is a commonly held belief about a group of people based on overly simplified conceptions or prior assumptions. Because most stereotypes contain some elements of truth, they cannot be entirely dismissed. But even when stereotypes are inaccurate, people nonetheless tend to cling to them. In other words, convincing people to abandon, or even to reexamine, a stereotype or a widely embraced belief is as difficult as trying to kill a vampire.
