The venue moves the odds. By how much?
Three hundred closed matters, three venues, three outcomes. Chi-square says venue and outcome are not independent, and the effect size says the link is real but modest, which is the half of the answer a p-value never gives you.
Legal Intermediate Statistics free
After you install, this is the model to open.
Does the Court Change the Settlement Rate?
- In your spreadsheet, click the Sortia icon in the strip of icons down the right-hand edge. No strip? Click the arrow at the bottom-right to open it. You can also use Extensions, then Sortia, then Open Sortia.
- Click Start from a template and put that name in the search box.
- Pick the card with that name and click Load this template. It arrives on a new tab with real numbers already in it.
The answer
Both halves of the answer, together:
- p-value
- 0.0029 chi-square 16.07 on 4 df
- Cramer's V
- 0.164 a small effect
- Settled, best venue
- 64 against 39 at the worst
- Priced
- $615,600 per hundred matters
Both statements are true at once and they are not in tension: the venue reliably shifts the odds, and the shift is modest next to everything else that decides an outcome. A p-value tells you the pattern is not noise; an effect size tells you how much of the outcome the pattern owns, and 0.164 is something you plan around rather than reorganise a practice around. Delete the withdrawn column and the association gets stronger, at a V of 0.249, because withdrawals were the outcome behaving most alike across venues and were diluting the signal. Enter counts and never rates: 60% of five matters and 60% of five hundred are not the same evidence.
The model
Venues down the rows, outcomes across the columns, whole counts in the cells, and a cost block beside the grid that prices the gap between the two extreme venues.
| Matters | 300, one hundred per venue |
| Venues | 3 |
| Outcomes | settled, withdrawn, tried |
| Best and worst venue | 64 settled against 39 |
| Chi-square, p and Cramer's V | calculated |
Once it is in your sheet
- The model arrives with real numbers in it and runs as it stands, so you can press the button first and understand it second.
- Change the numbers to yours. The sheet marks which cells are inputs and which hold formulas, and most labels carry a note explaining the row.
- Press the run button at the bottom of the panel. It is labeled for the tool you are in, and the result lands on its own tab, with a written reading of it beside the figures.
Never used Google Sheets? Start here goes the whole way, in seven steps, and assumes nothing.
Next question
- A legal matter risk register pricing five case risks against mitigation cost, showing which of the five mitigations lose money in expectation. Free template.What Could Go Wrong in This Matter?
- Which contingency matters actually lose you money?Will the Recovery Cover the Costs?
- What reserve holds nineteen years out of twenty?How Much Should We Reserve Per Matter?
- Is a bell curve the wrong shape for your claims?What Distribution Do Claim Sizes Follow?
- Two experts, one schedule. Where is the settlement zone?Delay Claim: Who Owns the Days?
- Neither side wants to blink. What happens?Deadline Standoff: Hold Firm or Concede?
Every model like this one, and the method behind them: Statistics in Google Sheets.