Gather Statistics Without Tears: An Introduction For Non-Mathematicians Executed By Derek Rowntree Contained In Copy

must read if you are interested in statistics, More so, if you are not, A brilliant read!

Will share the complete review soon, This is an absolute Ronseal book, it does exactly what it says on the tin,
I have been,over the years, what can only be described as a reluctant mathematician, This largely springs from having been the recipient of a mediocre schooling in basic maths, In turn this has meant that my understanding of the further complexities of maths and statistics has been sketchy in the extreme, And for a Nurse soon about to embark on a PhD that could be considered a big tick in the, oh dear this could be tougher than it looks box.

Roundtree's book though is an absolute God send, It's helped me to understand the principles which lie at the heart of the statistics and what statistics can and can't show, It's not been an easy read, I have had to take it in small bite sized pieces, often rereading sections to ensure I have what was said pinned down, I would still not claim to be comfortable with stats but I do now feel a little more comfortable with them,
A great and eternally useful book and one I'm sure will be always near at hand to help me refresh my understanding over the next few years as I tackle my PhD.
I saw this on the shelf and immediately picked it up I didn't have the best relationship with stats and wanted to try and salvage it before plunging into A Level Further Stats, which would have fully sent me into ruin if I didnt at least try to attempt to love it.


Essentially, the book covers all the statistics in A Level Maths and bits of Further Stats, explaining it in an accessible way and actively encourages you to think so there really is no escape.
The hatred of crunching numbers and learning methods without understanding what I was doing has now been rectified,

I've probably picked the best time to read it, warmed up my brain after a summer of not much mathematical thinking and I am sure I'll be rereading sections throughout next year as we cover them.
I do have to mention that stats does not go only as far as a module in A Level Further Maths, it is very much used around and beyond.
. I hope I now think a little more statistically than before

The book promised no tears, and I haven't cried! Yet, at least


'the possibility of bias in samples, the distinction between significance and importance, the fact that correlation does not imply causation, and that people sometimes simply get things wrong.
'



have a stats test tomorrow, revising the concepts actually made sense, . very grateful but we will see how it goes
I failed my first test ever, . . lost all marks the large data set
Further Stats module is very enjoyable so far!!! I locked myself in my apartment and read this book one weekend.
It made statistics more concrete, clear, and less nebulous, Thanks to this book and some exceptional stats instructors, I now enjoy stats, It is nearly impossible to write a good statistics book, I have seen numerous terrible ones, This one is an accomplishment, I select this book to read because I tried to decide whether I take Statistics and Operation Research as my minor or not because the book offered an introduction to this subject.
I'm glad to say that I set my mind to let statistics be my minor,

The book is well written, and the topics are adequate, they develop section after section, I liked the intuitive way of presenting the topics they helped me to gain the underline principles,
The author has an admirable talent in delivering the concepts, Also, a good thing in his style in this book is the reader faces questions in between the ideas presented, The nature of these questions helps the reader to concentrate more on the topic and can be answered mentally, The purpose of such questions is to help the reader really understand the topic, not just pass the eyes on it without processing the concepts,

The main idea of the book is to present the most basic and essential concepts in statistics,

In the first section, the author starts to talk about what is statistics, what are the alphabetical concepts in statistics, and how statistics help in the realworld problems, and how it relates to the nature of human reasoning.


The second section is about describing the sample, so to analyze the data so we can extract information, we need to categorize them, which is the purpose of this section.


The third section is about how to present the data in a useful way so we can obtain the pattern and knowledge from the data instead of just having a separated data with no context.


In the fourth section, the author introduces the concept of the normal distribution, "the iconic bellshaped graph," and he emphasized the use of it, I was surprised when he presented the example of Bill and Linda's scores comparison, He compared Bill's score in economic and Linda's score in law, which at first glance seemed to be uncomparable,

In the fifth section, he starts the dataanalysis work by presenting the concept of sample and population and how statisticians use the samples to inference knowledge about the population.


In the sixth section, he talks about comparing samples to determine whether they came from the same population or not, also, how to camper the means and proportions.


The seventh section is about statistical tests that help us to determine the reliability of the results,

In the eighth section, which is the last one, he introduces the concept of correlation and regression, I really liked this section because it is an important topic, and many people may miss interpret it,

In the end, the author summed up the topics and wrote a caution about the use of statistics and how some people misuse it,

I recommend this book to anyone interested in the use of statistics or want to study statistics, It is an easy and smooth book to read nevertheless needs a concentration, This is a wonderful little companion for an introductory statistics class, my only qualm is it goes from calling scatter diagrams 'dot diagrams' to suddenly trying to explain chisquares using only words.
Helpful if you prefer to learn by understanding why you are doing something, rather than just cookbook maths, A solid book trying to make statistics just a tad more enjoyable, If you work your way through it, preferably with a pen and paper at hand, you'll surely discover a thing or two that you didn't think of before.
Were you totally uninterested by statistics before reading, I doubt you'll feel any more passion for the subject after reading, On the other hand the statistical probability that you even considered reading this book unless you actually wanted to improve your skills to begin with, . . is most likely rather low, Book Ranking System:
Bad Do not read
Okay Read Once/ Dont Bother Twice
Good Read at Least Once
Great Read at Least Twice
Incredible Buy Book and Visit Often

It was okay but as someone who has no invested nterest in statistics it did get a little information heavy.
If I was more reliant on stats for work or general information I would certainly pick this book up again,

That being said there were some good tidbits of information on misuse of statistics by third parties to strengthen their cause, Biases in marketing is a topic that interests me since I am obviously a consumer myself,

I wish I understood statistics better and would definitely give this book another go if it would help me, สำหรบเดกออน Stat อยางผม อานแลวอยากจะดงคนเขยนมาจบดวยความขอบคณสกท เปนสถตแบบทใชเรยนตอนป. ตรเลย แตอธบายดวยภาษาคน และการใสตวอยางมาแบบไมมกก ทำใหเนอหาหลายๆ อยางทตอนเรยนเรารสกวา "ทำไมมนนามธรรมจงวะ ตกลงไอทเรากำลงคำนวณกนอยนมนคออะไร" เคลยรขนมาเยอะเลย

สวนตวแลวชอบครบ อานดวยความสนกสนานกวาตอนเรยนเยอะ แตสำหรบคนทเกงหรอเขาใจเนอหาไดตงแตตอนเรยนอยแลว อาจจะมองวามนธรรมดากได This book was probably the most lucidly written book that I have come across that explains Statistics to a person entirely alien to the field.

Unfortunately, even then I got lost by the end,

Regardless, this should be the first book anyone should read if they want an introduction to the world of statistics, It contains no calculations and it is very engaging,

Though, I might have to read it again and look for more books that can demystify this subject in context of social science, A bloody godsend! Honestly, I wanted to cry in progress

Contents

Introduction
How to use this book
, Statistical inquiry
making sense of experience
What is statistics
Descriptive and inferential statistics
Collecting a sample

, Describing our sample
Statistical variables
Error, accuracy and approximations

, Summarizing our data
Tables and diagrams
Central tendency averages
Measures of dispersion

, The shape of a distribution
Skewed distributions
, From sample to population

, Comparing samples

. Further matters of significance

, Analysing relationships

Postscript

Caution

Further Reading

Index
I have a rather irregular history with statistics, After disliking maths GCSE but getting a very good mark, I avoided Alevel maths like the plague, Upon arriving at university as a freshfaced undergrad, I was disconcerted to discover that the first year of my social science degree included a compulsory statistics module.
I passed that, then chose modules with no maths for the remaining two years, My dissertation was entirely qualitative, When I returned to studying as postgrad years later, Id grudgingly come to accept that statistics are useful, My masters course included two statistics modules, which I appreciated the purpose of without enjoying, Then somehow, during the peculiar derangement of my PhD, I ended up teaching myself to use a fairly complex statistical methodology: multinomial logistic regression, The majority of my PhD research was quantitative, Now I find myself actually teaching statistics to undergrads, Myyear old self would be amazed and horrified, Its quite possible that Im still outgrowing an ingrained dislike of maths that has much more to do with uninspired school teaching than the subject itself, In any case, I have a decent grasp of what stats are and why theyre useful, by social science standards,



So why read this book Because the undergrads I taught this term, and probably the postgrads Ill teach next term, appear petrified and confused by quantitative methods.
Its so difficult to tell whether students are really grasping the concepts you explain in lectures, particularly when theres no exam to test comprehension, These are social science students and their prior exposure to stats seems to have been minimal, When I spotted this book in library, I wondered if it could help me to explain the basics more clearly, And I think it just might, I found it very easy to follow and a helpful reminder, Rowntrees explanation of the difference between parametric and nonparametric tests is especially lucid and useful, That said, I doubt I'll have time to include such careful and painstaking explanations in my lectures, Ill definitely recommend the book to students, though, Its not at all fashionable to suggest students read entire books, but honestly I think this one is much better than an explanatory video, the more trendy teaching medium.


What this book cannot do, of course, is show you how to perform ttests, correlation analysis, and regression in Excel or a proper stats programme.
I like R and tolerate SPSS, While use of R or similar enables speedy and convenient quantitative analysis to a degree that was impossible in the era of graphing calculators, it also encourages an air of mystery around statistical techniques generally.
The actual theory behind the technique is concealed, This book is brilliant for demystification it narrates without equations to make clear that stats arent some arcane form of computer science, In the absence of basic understanding, its pointless to feed your data into a stats programme as you wont understand the results you get, even if you happen upon a suitable technique for analysis.
In a research methods lecture, there is sadly little time to cover explanatory fundamentals as the focus is on applied techniques, Somehow over more thanyears, my refusal to take Alevel maths has evolved into a wish that my students had taken it, Truly academia is fraught with irony,

Be that as it may, if you teach statistics to reluctant students, this book will give you helpful suggestions and food for thought, If youre a reluctant student, or just wary of statistics, I highly recommend reading it as a short and gentle introduction, If nothing else, statistics are an extraordinary powerful force in the datasaturated world we live in, A basic understanding of their underpinnings and limitations will really help you to make sense of life, As I argued to my students, they can also make you seem like a magician to people who fear statistics, In academia, a clear understanding of stats is essential to enable you criticise other peoples work, Which is surely the whole point of research, .