Intermediate Statistics
A Conceptual Course
- Brett W. Pelham - Georgetown University, USA, Montgomery College, USA
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Hands on Data Analysis: A Second Course in Statistics is a student-friendly text for advanced undergraduate and graduate courses. It begins with an introductory chapter that reviews descriptive and inferential statistics in plain language, avoiding extensive emphasis on complex formulas. The remainder of the text covers 13 different statistical topics ranging from descriptive statistics to advanced multiple regression analysis and path analysis. Each chapter contains a description of the logic of each set of statistical tests or procedures and then introduces students to a series of data sets using SPSS, with screen captures and detailed step-by-step instructions. Students acquire an appreciation of the logic of descriptive and inferential statistics, and an understanding of which techniques are best suited to which kinds of data or research questions.
“The text is highly readable, and the author has done a good job making difficult topics like path analysis easy for students to comprehend. As much as possible, the author uses simple language and explains things in ways that students would be able to grasp. His incorporation of numerous examples helps to facilitate this goal as well.”
“The key strengths of this text are is applied perspective, focusing on conceptual understanding of data analyses rather than arcane statistical proofs. It finds just the right balance of technical, conceptual and practical perspectives. In addition, the heavy reliance on real-world examples and supplemental information in appendices will render it an invaluable resource for young graduate students as they progress in their research training.”
“This is a breath of fresh air compared to most statistics texts—rigorous but highly readable. The author does an impressive job of making statistical concepts feel intuitive. In addition, the integration of datasets and SPSS problems to solve make this book unique.”
This is an excellent textbook but for our purposes this would be more suitable on a postgraduate level.
The book is userfriendly, with examples/hypothetical studies that are very helpful and entertaining, making statistical analysis almost fun for a non-statistician. Although we do not use SPSS statistics software programming for our data analysis, the syntax and examples provided are very helpful.
This book is well-written and covers a range of important statistical methods. However, I would have preferred more emphasis on the mathematics and less on SPSS (even though I realise that students have a tendency to rely heavily upon the programme).
Clearly written with essential chapters on more advanced topics (appropriate use of ANCOVA; path analysis). Recommended for graduate students in clinical psychology.
A well written book that provides a wonderful coverage of a range of key statistical concepts. Particularly useful for regression analysis as it covers variants of this method that are rarely seen in other statistics books for the same audience. I am not adopting this book however as apart from this it adds very little over and above what is currently being used by my students, the interactive SPSS data sets and screenshots are also a little dated by comparison. A very good book, just doesn't do enough different for it to be adopted.
I consider this book as the next in line after digesting Neil Salkind book - Statistics for people who hate statistics. I would recommend this book to Geography post-graduates given that the conceptual approach adopted in this book.
Perfect for my course, both in terms of the way that the chapters are very similar to my course outline but also with the incorporation of SPSS