title: Toward an explanation of the power law artifact: insights from response surface analysis.
abstract: The power law (y = ax-b) has been shown to provide a good description of data collected in a wide range of fields in psychology. R. B. Anderson and Tweney (1997) suggested that the model's data-fitting success may in part be artifactual, caused by a number of factors, one of which is the use of improper data averaging methods. The present paper follows up on their work and explains causes of the power law artifact. A method for studying the geometric relations among responses generated by mathematical models is introduced that shows the artifact is a result of the combined contributions of three factors: arithmetic averaging of data that are generated from a nonlinear model in the presence of individual differences.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychology, Ohio State University, Columbus 43210-1222, USA. myung.1@osu.edu
authors.forename: I J
authors.initials: IJ
authors.lastname: Myung
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.forename: M A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Pitt
mesh_terms: D001519:Behavior / Q000502:physiology*; D006801:Humans; D008960:Models, Psychological; D017711:Nonlinear Dynamics; D013269:Stochastic Processes