Background

For several years, researchers have used statistics to try to determine the author of a disputed literary work .These techniques have been applied to the Federalist Papers, disputed Shakespearean plays, and other works including The Book of Mormon.

These methods are commonly called wordprinting or stylometry. One technique used in wordprint analysis is to count the frequency with which an author uses non-contextual words. These are words that do not convey meaning but connect the ideas into sentences. It is postulated that an author who is trying to forge a work would not be able to control their subconscious use of these words.

So, if Joseph Smith wrote The Book of Mormon, we should expect to see his “wordprint” throughout the text, and the frequency of use of non-contextual words is one way to observe this. The most common non-contextual words used in The Book of Mormon are: “and,” “of,” “that,” “the,” “to” and “unto.”

Your Task

Your assignment is to apply wordprinting to the Book of Mormon by going through the five step process of a statistical study. Follow these steps to get started:

  • Choose 4-6 different prophets/authors in the Book of Mormon to perform the wordprinting on. (Ensure you select a major author, one that has sufficient writing to sample).

  • Select a sample of each of their writings. (Note: if the author is quoting someone else, that will not be a good representation of their word print and should NOT be included in the sample). There is no limit on how much or how little to sample. As a guide, try to capture about one chapter worth. At a bare minimum, you should sample enough so that you can meet the requirements of the hypothesis test.

  • Count the frequency of each of the 6 non-contextual words: “and,” “of,” “that,” “the,” “to” and “unto.”

  • Analyze the data, including a chi-squared hypothesis test of independence, to investigate whether the Book of Mormon contains the writings of different authors.

Example Presentation Guidance

  • Slide 1: Give your presentation a Title where the title would give the reader of your presentation a clear idea of what type of test you are doing as well as the subject matter of your test. (You may decide to come back and create this slide last, since you will have a better idea of what an effective title would be once you go through the test.) Include the names of all the group members who are present today and helping your with this project.
  • Slides 2 and 3: Design the Study and Collect the Data. Here you should state your research question and your hypotheses (null and alternative). State your population and how the data was gathered. Add any other information you think the reader will need to know to understand this study. Be concise and do not clutter the slide. Too many words on a slide detract from the presentation.
  • Slide 4: Describe the Data that was collected. Include a table, or better yet, a graphical representation of your data (ensure clear labeling of the table/chart). Numerical summarize may be helpful to include. Add a sentence or two to describe to the reader what the chart represents and interesting points to observe.
  • Slides 5: Make Inference. Write out the hypothesis test. Include all the following steps:
    • Explain how the requirements are met or fail to be met.
    • State the null and alternative hypothesis, as well as your significance level.
    • State the Test Statistic
    • State the P-value
    • State your conclusion about the null hypothesis
    • State your conclusion in context of the original research question
  • Slide 6: Take Action. What action should be taken as a result of the study? What other studies or remaining questions could be explored? If you failed to reject the null hypothesis, exactly what does that mean?

In addition to these questions, please specifically address why it would (or would not) be a good idea to apply wordprinting to other Books of Scripture (the Old Testament, New Testament, Pear of Great Price, or Doctrine and Convenants): how could this be done, would it be valid, what would it prove, etc.