Whenever the weather permits, I choose to walk the 45-minutes to work along the streets of Boston. In addition to enjoying the sunshine, I have found a number of statistics-themed podcasts to listen to along the way that are insightful and enjoyable for listeners of any background. Here is a shortlist of some of my favorites:
Stats + Stories (NPR)
Stats and Stories hosted by John Bailer and Richard Campbell is “about the statistics behind the stories and the stories behind the statistics.” Weekly, 30-min episodes explore quantitative ideas in our daily lives and feature distinguished professionals and scholars presenting their research, work products, or just bubbling new ideas. Some recent topics I really enjoyed include the reproducibility crisis in biomedical research, the statistics behind aging, and ways to make forensic science more scientific.
More or Less: Behind the Statistics (BBC Radio 4)
More or Less is instantly addictive. Hosted by Tim Harford, a brilliant economist and award-winning journalist, this podcast is devoted to explaining the economic ideas behind everyday experiences. Episodes are issued several times a week and last between 10-25 minutes. The focus is on explaining, or debunking, the statistics reported in the news, political debates, or just daily life. I especially enjoyed the episode that raised awareness of the historical lack of women in clinical trials and the one that questioned the Chernobyl disaster death count (this topic hit home with me as I grew up in Ukraine).
Planet Money (NPR)
Planet Money is an “economics-for-dummies” podcast and one of my long-time favorites! Episodes are brilliant, engaging, and are just the right length (20-25 min) for an easy listen. They come out twice a week and explore complex topics on latest events in global economy in fun and accessible way. Originally launched during the financial crisis of 2008 as a series of episodes trying to make sense of the Great Recession, today Planet Money is still going strong and continues to provide insights into everyday events with an economics angle.
In addition to my three favorites above, here are some runner-ups:
Microsoft Research Podcast is a rather technical full-length podcast that comes out every week and covers the company’s investigations into new cutting-edge tech research.
The R-Podcast: Authored by Eric Nantz, a Research Scientist at Eli Lilly, this podcast helps me keep up-to-date with the latest news in the R/RStudio world.
ASA Biopharm’s Podcast is a monthly podcast that features leaders from pharmaceutical industry and regulatory agencies talking about upcoming statistical conferences and events, and discussing current issues in Biopharmaceutical statistics.