Is the choice of statistical paradigm critical in extreme event attribution studies?

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dc.contributor.authorStott, Peter A.
dc.contributor.authorKaroly, David J.
dc.contributor.authorZwiers, Francis W.
dc.date.accessioned2025-04-10T20:27:28Z
dc.date.available2025-04-10T20:27:28Z
dc.date.issued2017
dc.description.abstractThe science of event attribution meets a mounting demand for reliable and timely information about the links between climate change and individual extreme events. Studies have estimated the contribution of human-induced climate change to the magnitude of an event as well as its likelihood, and many types of event have been investigated including heatwaves, floods, and droughts. Despite this progress, such approaches have been criticised for being unreliable and for being overly conservative. We argue that such criticisms are misplaced. Rather, a false dichotomy has arisen between Bconventional^ approaches and new alternative framings. We have three points to make about the choice of statistical paradigm for event attribution studies. First, different approaches to event attribution may choose to occupy different places on the conditioning spectrum. Providing this choice of conditioning is communicated clearly, the value of such choices depends ultimately on their utility to the user concerned. Second, event attribution is an estimation problem for which either frequentist or Bayesian paradigms can be used. Third, for hypothesis testing, the choice of null hypothesis is context specific. Thus, the null hypothesis of human influence is not inherently a preferable alternative to the usual null hypothesis of no human influence.
dc.description.reviewstatusReviewed
dc.description.scholarlevelFaculty
dc.description.sponsorshipPAS is supported by the Joint UK DECCBEIS/Defra Met Office Hadley Centre Climate Programme (GA01101). DJK is supported by the ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate System Science (grant CE 110001028).
dc.identifier.citationStott, P. A., Karoly, D. J., & Zwiers, F. W. (2017). Is the choice of statistical paradigm critical in extreme event attribution studies? Climatic Change, 144(2), 143–150. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-017-2049-2
dc.identifier.urihttps://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-017-2049-2
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/1828/21819
dc.language.isoen
dc.publisherClimatic Change
dc.rightsCC BY 4.0
dc.rights.urihttps://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
dc.subjectUN SDG 13: Climate Action
dc.subject#journal article
dc.subjectPacific Climate Impacts Consortium (PCIC)
dc.titleIs the choice of statistical paradigm critical in extreme event attribution studies?
dc.typeArticle

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