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Making Sense of Statistics: A Conceptual Overview
• An overview of descriptive and inferential statistics without formulas and computations. • Clear and to-the-point narrative makes this short book perfect for all courses in which statistics are discussed. • Helps statistics students who are struggling with the concepts. Shows them the meanings of the statistics they are computing. • This book is easy to digest because it is divided into short sections with review questions at the end of each section. • Running sidebars draw students’ attention to important concepts.
170 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1995
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
September 3, 2019
This book aims to provide a "conceptual overview" of statistics. In that, it succeeds reasonably well, but its introduction to statistical thinking, in its attempt to be gentle to those who are unfamiliar with mathematics, ends up being too superficial to be practical for all but the most limited of audiences.
If you have never before taken any course in statistics AND have little interest in actually performing any statistical calculations of your own, this might be a decent book for you. It will give you enough information to have a general idea of what researchers are talking about when they report their findings and readers in this category will find the lack of mathematical formulae throughout the book merciful. However, if you have even basic experience with statistics, it likely won't tell you much (if anything) new. More importantly, if you have any desire to ever compute a statistic of your own, you'll find this book unhelpful. All but the most elementary of formulae are confined to a brief appendix where mathematical expressions are presented without explanation. The result is that reading the body of the text provides no mathematics and reading the formulae provides no context, so the reader will struggle to connect the two. And even if the reader does successfully connect formula to concept, the book offers little by way of mathematical sophistication.
Some would argue that, in the age of computerized calculation, it's more important to understand concepts than formulae anyway, and I agree in part. While rote memorization of mathematical expressions is probably not the best use of a student's time, no conceptual understanding of statistics can be complete without a deeper understanding of the mathematics operating below the surface. For that understanding, you'll have to seek out other books (personally, I like Chihara & Hesterberg's Mathematical Statistics for the more mathematically inclined, or Gravetter & Wallnau's Statistics for the Behavioral Sciences for the less mathematically inclined, though there are plenty of other options out there).
Where this book shines is in its method of holding the reader's hand through explanations of some rather abstract concepts. It probably would have been stronger had it contained a greater variety of explanatory examples, but the reader is genuinely left with an understanding, however basic, of the reasoning behind a handful of the most common statistical techniques. On the other hand, as understanding statistics becomes increasingly important in public life, so does a careful understanding of some incredibly subtle points about interpreting statistics. While this book briefly touches on such topics the correct understanding of statistical significance and effect size, there is a world of subtler points that I think should have been covered. The reader ought to (but probably won't) come away from a book like this with a strong intuitive understanding of just what the p-value really means, for instance, and how it can be manipulated by the careless or unscrupulous researcher.
Where does that leave this book? It's great for the non-researcher who wants to get just a bit deeper into understanding how statistics works without actually bothering to study the field, and it would probably make a welcome companion for the student struggling to understand the conceptual underpinnings of a first course in statistics, but it can't substitute for a more mathematical text for the practitioner and doesn't get quite deep enough into the conceptual subtleties for the armchair philosopher.
If you have never before taken any course in statistics AND have little interest in actually performing any statistical calculations of your own, this might be a decent book for you. It will give you enough information to have a general idea of what researchers are talking about when they report their findings and readers in this category will find the lack of mathematical formulae throughout the book merciful. However, if you have even basic experience with statistics, it likely won't tell you much (if anything) new. More importantly, if you have any desire to ever compute a statistic of your own, you'll find this book unhelpful. All but the most elementary of formulae are confined to a brief appendix where mathematical expressions are presented without explanation. The result is that reading the body of the text provides no mathematics and reading the formulae provides no context, so the reader will struggle to connect the two. And even if the reader does successfully connect formula to concept, the book offers little by way of mathematical sophistication.
Some would argue that, in the age of computerized calculation, it's more important to understand concepts than formulae anyway, and I agree in part. While rote memorization of mathematical expressions is probably not the best use of a student's time, no conceptual understanding of statistics can be complete without a deeper understanding of the mathematics operating below the surface. For that understanding, you'll have to seek out other books (personally, I like Chihara & Hesterberg's Mathematical Statistics for the more mathematically inclined, or Gravetter & Wallnau's Statistics for the Behavioral Sciences for the less mathematically inclined, though there are plenty of other options out there).
Where this book shines is in its method of holding the reader's hand through explanations of some rather abstract concepts. It probably would have been stronger had it contained a greater variety of explanatory examples, but the reader is genuinely left with an understanding, however basic, of the reasoning behind a handful of the most common statistical techniques. On the other hand, as understanding statistics becomes increasingly important in public life, so does a careful understanding of some incredibly subtle points about interpreting statistics. While this book briefly touches on such topics the correct understanding of statistical significance and effect size, there is a world of subtler points that I think should have been covered. The reader ought to (but probably won't) come away from a book like this with a strong intuitive understanding of just what the p-value really means, for instance, and how it can be manipulated by the careless or unscrupulous researcher.
Where does that leave this book? It's great for the non-researcher who wants to get just a bit deeper into understanding how statistics works without actually bothering to study the field, and it would probably make a welcome companion for the student struggling to understand the conceptual underpinnings of a first course in statistics, but it can't substitute for a more mathematical text for the practitioner and doesn't get quite deep enough into the conceptual subtleties for the armchair philosopher.
March 30, 2025
A book for my Research Methods class- so not quite as enjoyable as my other fun reads. I do have to say that reading this book cover to cover was more informative than I expected. This book did such a great job of putting statistical concepts into easy, yet accurate, terms that made so many pieces fall into place for me. I feel like my understanding of statistics has increased more from reading this than when I took a statistics class in undergrad. It also has a plethora of examples and questions to check your understanding that helped me gauge how well I was retaining and then able to apply information. I was really impressed with this book and how it was able to concisely simplify so many different concepts in a way that almost felt like I was reading a book instead of a textbook.
February 10, 2017
This book gives an excellent foundation for comprehending statistical data. It was written on a basic level, with a readable and enjoyable tone. I liked it! I especially appreciated the sidebars which give summaries of main ideas. I only wish that there was an index and a glossary included.
May 24, 2021
Written in such a way that is easy to understand for beginners. Definitions are always easy to find and they make sense.
March 14, 2024
definitely made sense!
January 23, 2010
Stats for people who are really afraid of it. This book breaks things down so simply, it would be acceptable for elementary school children.
December 13, 2016
Simplified lessons - good for beginners.
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February 2, 2018519.5 P998 2014
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews