Elementary Statistics

Introduction
 Statistics
A branch of mathematics dealing with the
collection, analysis, interpretation, and
presentation of masses of numerical data.

Statistics for the Social Sciences emphasizes

the analysis and interpretation of data to give
students a feel for how data interpretation is
related to the methods by which the
information was obtained.
 Statistics (Contd…)
• “Statistics are numerical statement of facts in
any department of enquiry placed in relation
to each other.” ----By Bowley

• “By Statistics we mean quantitative data

affected to a marked extent by multiplicity of
causes.” ---By Yule and Kendall
 Psychological research and statistics
• psychologists do not study statistics for its own
sake. Statistical tests simply provide a tool for:
• analyzing the results of psychological research.
• The aim of psychological research is to test
psychological theories about
– human behavior and to make predictions about
human behavior
• in order to test whether the results of the
research support the prediction or not.
Psychological research and statistics

Once you appreciate that the point of

psychological research is to test research
predictions, you will find that learning to
select and use statistical tests will be
reasonably straightforward.
Variability in human behaviour
One of the particular aspects of humans is
that they vary a great deal in their
characteristics and behaviour. So it is difficult
for psychologists to make predictions that will
apply to all human beings in exactly the same
way. Even identical twins develop differently,
depending on circumstances.
 Variability in human behaviour
(Contd..)
• For this reason, psychological researchers
make predictions in a way that reflects the
variability in human behaviour.

• The variability between humans is formulated

as variables. The aim of psychological research
is to study variables in human behaviour.
 Ungrouped vs Grouped
Ungrouped Grouped
It is the data that you first It is data that has been
gather. organized into groups
Ungrouped data is data in known as classes.
raw. Grouped data has been
‘classified’ and thus some
level of analysis has taken
place, which mean that
data is no longer raw.
It is organized in a
frequency distribution.
Types of Statistics
Interval, nominal, ordinal, ratio
 Parametric Test
• If the information about the population is
completely known by means of its parameters
then statistical test is called parametric tests.

Example: t-test, z-test, ANOVA, regression

**parameter: a numerical measurement

describing some characteristic of a population.
 Non-Parametric Test
• If there is no knowledge about the population
or parameters, but still it is required to test
the hypothesis of the population. Then it is
called non-parametric test.

• Example: mann-Whitney, rank sum test,

Kruskal-Wallis test, chi-square
 Types of Descriptive Tests
Measures of Measures of Central Measures of Measures of
Frequency Tendency Dispersion or Position
Variation
Use this when you Use this when you Use this when you Use this when you
want to show how want to show how want to show how need to compare
often response is an average or most “spread out” the scores to a
given commonly indicated data are. normalized score
response

• Count • Mean • Range: High/Low • Percentiles

• Percent • Median Points • Quartiles
• Frequency • Mode • Variance &
Standard Deviation
(S.D): difference
between observed
score and mean
 Limitations of Statistics
• Statistics is not suitable to the study of
qualitative phenomenon
• Statistics does not study individuals
• Statistics table may be misused
• Statistics is only, one of the methods studying
a problem