Statistical Literacy on Regression Analysis in Brazilian Economics Courses: How Are Things Going?

This research aims to analyze what Brazilian economics students know about regression analysis, based on the different types of knowledge/skills in statistical literacy proposed by Gal (2002). For this, we used one question of the main assessment instrument of Brazilian higher education: the National Exam for the Assessment of Student Performance. Skills using formulas and statistical algorithms were not the most important knowledge required to answer the question. Students needed to express an opinion using only results from hypothesis tests; students did not have requisite information to conduct the tests themselves. Given the low percentage of correct answers on this question, we hypothesize that the statistical literacy perspective has not been developed within the scope of Brazilian economics courses.