Occupations

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jeopardyhopeful
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Occupations

Post by jeopardyhopeful »

I did a little project of my own to see what are the most common occupations that Jeopardy! contestants report. I had my hunches, but I wanted to do at least a little study to see if my hunches were correct. I realize that 255 contestants is not a terribly big sample size, and results may be very different if I carried this out to thousands of contestants, but this was just my fun little thing. Keep in mind I'm not a statistician or demographer, so don't place too much importance on this. Also, this is just from Sep 2013 to May 2014.

For business-related jobs, for those sub-jobs that are fairly common, like sales or marketing or accounting, I listed them separately. All others I put in the Business/Management/Consulting group. And ALL students, regardless of type (medical, law, business, graduate, undergraduate, etc), I put in the Students group.

I was a little surprised that the "Writer/Publisher" group had as many representatives as it did, and that the "Medicine/Nursing/Health Care" group had as few as they did.

Educator/Administration/Tutor 39
Lawyer/Paralegal 28
Student 27
Writer/Publisher/Editor/Video Producer 24
Business/Management/Consulting 15
IT/IM/CompSci/Internet 12
Librarian/Museum 11
Retail Jobs/Service Jobs 10
Engineer/Compliance/Architect 9
Scientist/Lab Tech/Researcher 8
Government/Social Work/Foreign Service 8
Medicine/Nursing/Health Care Jobs 6
Communications 5
Non-Profit 5
Human Resources 5
Military/retired military 5
Marketing 4
Household employment/Stay-at-home parent 4
Accounting/Controller 4
Entertainment/Acting/Radio 4
Actuary/Statistician/Mathematician 3
Firefighter/Law Enforcement/Security 3
Journalist 3
Musician/Singer 3
Artist 2
Construction 2
Airlines/Travel 2
Sales 2
Clergy 1
Veterinarian 1
255
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jfrumkin
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Re: Occupations

Post by jfrumkin »

Interesting. There's cross-over, too. I'm non-profit, but would also fit into business. I'm sure there are people who would fit more than two categories.
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TheyCallMeMrKid
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Re: Occupations

Post by TheyCallMeMrKid »

jeopardyhopeful wrote: I was a little surprised that the "Writer/Publisher" group had as many representatives as it did,
I'm too lazy to go back and look it up, but didn't someone say on another thread this week that they claimed to be a "writer" so they didn't have to actually admit the crappy job from which they are actually drawing a paycheck?
jeopardyhopeful wrote: and that the "Medicine/Nursing/Health Care" group had as few as they did.
Perhaps if there were more physiology questions, and fewer 17th century literature questions?
jeopardyhopeful wrote: Educator/Administration/Tutor 39
Sure, they have a whole week dedicated just to them! :lol:
Sheepin' it real.
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Leah
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Re: Occupations

Post by Leah »

What's Compliance doing with Engineer and Architect?
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BobF
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Re: Occupations

Post by BobF »

TheyCallMeMrKid wrote:
jeopardyhopeful wrote: Educator/Administration/Tutor 39
Student 27
Sure, they have a whole week dedicated just to them! :lol:
Students also
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This Is Kirk!
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Re: Occupations

Post by This Is Kirk! »

When Peter Dyakowski appeared last week I was wondering if he's the first professional athlete to appear in a normal Jeopardy! game. Anyone know?
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MarkBarrett
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Re: Occupations

Post by MarkBarrett »

This Is Kirk! wrote:When Peter Dyakowski appeared last week I was wondering if he's the first professional athlete to appear in a normal Jeopardy! game. Anyone know?
I put "professional" into the archive search box. How far are we willing to stretch the term of professional athlete? :)


http://www.j-archive.com/showplayer.php?player_id=8635

http://www.j-archive.com/showplayer.php?player_id=6607
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This Is Kirk!
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Re: Occupations

Post by This Is Kirk! »

MarkBarrett wrote:I put "professional" into the archive search box. How far are we willing to stretch the term of professional athlete? :)
"Not THAT far" is both cases!
jeopardyhopeful
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Re: Occupations

Post by jeopardyhopeful »

Oh, just to be clear, I did not include data from the Teachers' Tournament (or Teen Tournament). So that number of educators is from the regular shows only.
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BobF
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Re: Occupations

Post by BobF »

This Is Kirk! wrote:When Peter Dyakowski appeared last week I was wondering if he's the first professional athlete to appear in a normal Jeopardy! game. Anyone know?
It would be cool if they could get Matt Birk (Harvard grad who retired from the Ravens after their Super Bowl win). Though not if it means bumping me. :-)
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zakharov
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Re: Occupations

Post by zakharov »

If only I weren't quitting my non-profit job to go back to school...
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countyguy
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Re: Occupations

Post by countyguy »

How did you categorize Amy "aspiring student" Nienaber?
jeopardyhopeful
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Re: Occupations

Post by jeopardyhopeful »

How did you categorize Amy "aspiring student" Nienaber?
"Student".
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the_phil
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Re: Occupations

Post by the_phil »

Leah wrote:What's Compliance doing with Engineer and Architect?
I wondered the same thing. They're dramatically different.
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cinemaniax7
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Re: Occupations

Post by cinemaniax7 »

Writer, publisher, editor . . . video producer?
jeopardyhopeful
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Re: Occupations

Post by jeopardyhopeful »

I think there was one contestant who was a video producer of documentaries. Admittedly, I could have put it into a different group, and I struggled with this one, but eventually I had to classify it while trying to keep the number of groups manageable. Same thing with Engineer/Architect. They both design things, and the things they design are certainly different, but again...choices. I could have hundreds of groups, but I wanted an overall sense of occupation without getting too specific. I don't envy demographers or people involved in the census for having to do this sort of thing.
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