Datasets for Statistical Analysis

Lunacy

Keywords:

lunatics

Categories:

health
regression

Description:

The data are from a 1854 study involving the percentage of lunatics cared for at home and a number of associated factors for 14 counties in Massachusetts. The study was conducted by the Massachusetts Commission on Lunacy under the leadership of Edward Jarvis. Dr. Jarvis was President of the American Statistical Association from 1852 to 1882.

There are 14 observation on five variables, plus the names of the counties.

Variables:

Number	Number of lunatics, by county
Distance	Distance to nearest mental health centre
Population	County population in 1950 (in thousands)
PopDen	County population density per square mile
Cared	Percent of lunatics cared for at home

Data Quality:

There are no missing values.

Source:

The Data and Story Library, DASL, originally from J.M. Hunter, "Need and Demand for Mental Health Care: Massachusetts 1854," The Geographic Review, 77:2 (April 1987), pp 139-156.

Notes:

A study of the relationship between the percentage of lunatics cared for at home and distance to the nearest health centre is not linear but the relation to the reciprocal of distance is essentially linear.

A knowledge of the geography is very useful! The analyst should keep in mind that Suffolk County includes Boston, the largest population centre in the state, that Berkshire is the westernmost county in the state, and that Duke County (Martha's Vineyard) and Nantucket are islands offshore.

Nantucket is a clear outlier to the Cared vs Distance relationship as well as the relation to the reciprocal of distance. It is best indexed with an indicator (or dummy) variable. The student might also look at the Cared vs Population density relation. Note that population density and distance are highly correlated.

References: