Thomson Leaing, Inc.| 2008 | ISBN-10: 0-495-50218-9 | 499
pages
Basic Statistics: Tales of Distributions, Ninth Edition, is a textbook for a one-term statistics course in the social or behavioral sciences, education, or the allied health/ nursing field. Its focus is conceptualization, understanding, and interpretation, rather than computation. Although designed to be comprehensible and complete for students who take only one statistics course, it includes many elements that prepare students for additional statistics courses. Basic experimental design terms such as independent and dependent variables are explained so that students can be expected to write fairly complete interpretations of their analyses. In many places, the student is invited to stop and think or stop and do an exercise. Some problems simply ask the student to decide which statistical technique is appropriate. In sum, this book’s approach reinforces instructors who emphasize critical thinking in their course.
This textbook has been remarkably successful for more than 30 years, at times being a Wadsworth best-seller among statistics texts. Reviewers have praised the book as have students and professors. A common refrain is that the book has a conversational style that is engaging, especially for a statistics text. Other features that distinguish this textbook from others include:
? Problems are interspersed throughout the chapter rather than grouped at the end
? Answers to problems are extensive; there are more than 50 pages of detailed answers
? Examples and problems come from a variety of disciplines and everyday life
? Most problems are based on actual studies rather than fabricated scenarios
? Computer software analyses are illustrated with SPSS printouts
? Interpretation is emphasized; interpretation headings in the answers arehighlighted
? Important words and phrases are defined in the margin when they first occur
? The effect size index is treated as a descriptive statistic and not just an add-on to hypothesis-testing problems
? Objectives at the beginning of each chapter serve first as an orientation list and later as a review list
? Clues to the Future alert students to concepts that will be repeated
? Error Detection boxes tell ways to detect or prevent mistakes
? Transition Passages alert students to changes in focus that are part of the chapters that follow
? Comprehensive Problems encompass all (or most) of the techniques in a chapter
? What Would You Recommend? problems require choices from among the techniques in several chapters
? The Wadsworth website has a variety of student aids for each chapter
New to the Ninth Edition
? The three ANOVA chapters are reorganized to reflect the way many instructors teach their course. Factorial ANOVA now comes after one-factor repeated-measures ANOVA
? Nine examples in the text are accompanied by SPSS printouts, reflecting the increasing use of SPSS in psychology and related fields
? Problems based on contemporary data are all updated, including new height data for Americans
? Twenty graphs are new or revised
? New notation for the problems makes the answers easier to find in the appendix
? Sections that are heavily revised include:
? Statistical power (now focuses on making correct decisions)
? The relationship between p and d (addressed and made explicit)
? The mean/median relationship in skewed distributions (the old rule of thumb can be wrong)
? Personal Control scores (replaced with the Satisfaction With Life Scale)
? Additions to the text include
? An operational definition of outliers as 1.5 _ IQR from the 25th and 75th percentiles
? d as an effect size index for ANOVA
? Deletions include
? J curves
? The explanation of the limits of decimal numbers
Content:
1 Introduction
2 Frequency Distributions and Graphs
3 Central Tendency and Variability
4 Other Descriptive Statistics
5 Correlation and Regression
6 Theoretical Distributions Including the Normal Distribution
7 Samples, Sampling Distributions, and Confidence Intervals
8 Hypothesis Testing and Effect Size: One-Sample Designs
9 Hypothesis Testing, Effect Size, and Confidence Intervals:Two-Sample Designs
10 Analysis of Variance: One-Way Classification
11 Analysis of Variance: One-Factor Repeated Measures
12 Analysis of Variance: Factorial Design
13 Chi Square Tests
14 More Nonparametric Tests
15 Choosing Tests and Writing Interpretations
Appendixes
A Arithmetic and Algebra Review
B Grouped Frequency Distributions and Central Tendency
C Tables
D Glossary of Words
E Glossary of Symbols
F Glossary of Formulas
G Answers to Problems
References
Index
Basic Statistics: Tales of Distributions, Ninth Edition, is a textbook for a one-term statistics course in the social or behavioral sciences, education, or the allied health/ nursing field. Its focus is conceptualization, understanding, and interpretation, rather than computation. Although designed to be comprehensible and complete for students who take only one statistics course, it includes many elements that prepare students for additional statistics courses. Basic experimental design terms such as independent and dependent variables are explained so that students can be expected to write fairly complete interpretations of their analyses. In many places, the student is invited to stop and think or stop and do an exercise. Some problems simply ask the student to decide which statistical technique is appropriate. In sum, this book’s approach reinforces instructors who emphasize critical thinking in their course.
This textbook has been remarkably successful for more than 30 years, at times being a Wadsworth best-seller among statistics texts. Reviewers have praised the book as have students and professors. A common refrain is that the book has a conversational style that is engaging, especially for a statistics text. Other features that distinguish this textbook from others include:
? Problems are interspersed throughout the chapter rather than grouped at the end
? Answers to problems are extensive; there are more than 50 pages of detailed answers
? Examples and problems come from a variety of disciplines and everyday life
? Most problems are based on actual studies rather than fabricated scenarios
? Computer software analyses are illustrated with SPSS printouts
? Interpretation is emphasized; interpretation headings in the answers arehighlighted
? Important words and phrases are defined in the margin when they first occur
? The effect size index is treated as a descriptive statistic and not just an add-on to hypothesis-testing problems
? Objectives at the beginning of each chapter serve first as an orientation list and later as a review list
? Clues to the Future alert students to concepts that will be repeated
? Error Detection boxes tell ways to detect or prevent mistakes
? Transition Passages alert students to changes in focus that are part of the chapters that follow
? Comprehensive Problems encompass all (or most) of the techniques in a chapter
? What Would You Recommend? problems require choices from among the techniques in several chapters
? The Wadsworth website has a variety of student aids for each chapter
New to the Ninth Edition
? The three ANOVA chapters are reorganized to reflect the way many instructors teach their course. Factorial ANOVA now comes after one-factor repeated-measures ANOVA
? Nine examples in the text are accompanied by SPSS printouts, reflecting the increasing use of SPSS in psychology and related fields
? Problems based on contemporary data are all updated, including new height data for Americans
? Twenty graphs are new or revised
? New notation for the problems makes the answers easier to find in the appendix
? Sections that are heavily revised include:
? Statistical power (now focuses on making correct decisions)
? The relationship between p and d (addressed and made explicit)
? The mean/median relationship in skewed distributions (the old rule of thumb can be wrong)
? Personal Control scores (replaced with the Satisfaction With Life Scale)
? Additions to the text include
? An operational definition of outliers as 1.5 _ IQR from the 25th and 75th percentiles
? d as an effect size index for ANOVA
? Deletions include
? J curves
? The explanation of the limits of decimal numbers
Content:
1 Introduction
2 Frequency Distributions and Graphs
3 Central Tendency and Variability
4 Other Descriptive Statistics
5 Correlation and Regression
6 Theoretical Distributions Including the Normal Distribution
7 Samples, Sampling Distributions, and Confidence Intervals
8 Hypothesis Testing and Effect Size: One-Sample Designs
9 Hypothesis Testing, Effect Size, and Confidence Intervals:Two-Sample Designs
10 Analysis of Variance: One-Way Classification
11 Analysis of Variance: One-Factor Repeated Measures
12 Analysis of Variance: Factorial Design
13 Chi Square Tests
14 More Nonparametric Tests
15 Choosing Tests and Writing Interpretations
Appendixes
A Arithmetic and Algebra Review
B Grouped Frequency Distributions and Central Tendency
C Tables
D Glossary of Words
E Glossary of Symbols
F Glossary of Formulas
G Answers to Problems
References
Index