Download Statistics for Dummies PDF by Deborah J. Rumsey published on 19 September 2003. You can download this book in PDF format from the link provided below.Â
Inside this book
The numbers explosion can leave you feeling overwhelmed and confused (but with the help of this book you’ll be able to understand many of the statistics you encounter in everyday life)! The purpose of this chapter is to bring another emotion to the surface: skepticism! Not skepticism like, “I can’t believe anything anymore”, but skepticism like, “Hmm, I wonder where that number came from.” “Is this really true?” “I need to find out more information about this study before I believe these results.” The media present you with many examples of statistics gone wrong, and after you find out how to spot these problems, you’ll be well on your way to becoming more confident about statistics, ready to tackle the explosion of the number!
Detecting Errors, Exaggerations, and Just Plain Lies
Statistics can go wrong for many different reasons. First, a simple, honest error could have taken place. This can happen to anyone, right?
Other times, the error is a little more than a simple, honest mistake. In the heat of the moment, because someone feels strongly about a cause and because the numbers don’t quite bear out the point that the researcher wants to make, statistics get tweaked, or, more commonly, they get exaggerated, either in terms of their values or in the way they’re represented and discussed.