A Review of “Statistics: Concepts and Controversies”

capricorn_ye

A Review of “Statistics: Concepts and Controversies”

I was delighted to be asked to give a review of “Statistics: Concepts and Controversies”, a book written by David Moore, it is already in its 6th edition after first print. I got to know this title by chance when I tried to search around for some elementary level starters for statistics, I read its lastest version recently. In fact you could even access some of the tools it mentioned from its website. http://www.whfreeman.com/sccbridgepage/.

The book doesn’t provide too many complex formulas to scare any beginners like me off. It quotes a lot of real examples and cases in our daily lives, extrapolate the concept and explain the myth behind certain phenomenon which could have puzzled us for a long while. For instance: in the first few chapters, P-value, confidence statement, statistical significance are derived after examples (mainly in US) are given and explained. I have now a better appreciation of the distinction between “observation” and “experiment”, also get to know the importance of SRS(simple random sample) in getting the real data for not being cheated. Another chapter to my personal interest is on simulation, the author gives detailed steps on how to do recursive simulation to get the expected results to either prove certain concepts or demystify the controversies.

Statistics is about probability-based events. It is built upon somewhat restrictive assumptions, with data analysis(diagnostic) tools to answer production questions on why and how things will happen (cause and effect).

Many other books on this discipline spend too much resource on mathematical science, even though it is necessary part of the education; it is not of interests to general public. On the contrary, this book presents the core statistical ideas thru instructive examples, not mathematical formulas.

In addition, the questions behind every chapter are well organized and related to concepts explained in the chapter, which helps greatly in stimulating reader’s individual thinking.

Overall I’d like to recommend whoever wants to know a bit of Statistics to begin with this book. It’s fun for reading, although a English-Chinese dictionary could be handy for those who are not native in English speaking.

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