Comments on journal guidelines for reporting statistics.

Abstract

This letter is prompted by 10 detailed guidelines for reporting statistics in journals published by The American Physiological Society. 1 I take issue with several of these guidelines. I also take issue with the two short paragraphs on statistics in the ‘Instructions to Authors’ issued by Clinical and Experimental Pharmacology and Physiology (CEEP). I have tried to resolve these differences. In his ‘Instructions for Authors’, the Editor-in-Chief of CEPP provides two short paragraphs of advice to prospective authors on how to present descriptive and analytical statistics (see the website http://www.blackwellpublishingasia.com). CEPP subscribes to the policies of The International Committee of Medical Journal Editors (ICMJE) (see the website http://www.icmje.org/). Should our Editor-in-Chief or the ICMJE do more? In contrast, the American Journals of Physiology have recently published an Editorial by Douglas Curran-Everett and Dale J. Benos in which they give 10, very detailed, guidelines for reporting statistics in journals published by the American Physiological Society (APS) (see the website http://www.ajpregu.org for details). 1 The APS adheres to the policies of the Council of Science Editors (CSE) (see the website http://www.councilscienceeditors.org). In this letter, I attempt to resolve the differences between minimalists and maximalists. I shall start to do this by considering the recommendations of Curran-Everett and Benos one-by-one.