Making Sense of Statistics – Michael Wood

Making Sense of Statistics provides a thorough, but accessible, introduction to statistics and probability, without the distractions of mathematics. The book does not require you to use any algebraic formulae or equations, but it does explain how and why methods work, and exactly what answers mean. Guidance is provided on how to design investigations, analyze data and interpret results. There are exercises and case studies from a variety of areas of application, and an accompanying website from which interactive spreadsheet models and data files can be downloaded.

REVIEW

‘I would recommend this book to any student following a non-science type of course at university.’ – Susan Starkings,Significance(Magazine of The Royal Statistical Society)

‘There is a lot of very helpful…text explaining the concepts, and also giving many practical hints for particular situations…the style of presentation is very good, giving an impression that the book is a pleasure to read and relatively easy to understand…In any case, it is very interesting to know that most of the basic ideas of statistics can be consistantly and nicely explained with surprisingly simple means…The book can definitely be very helpful for anyone who needs to know about statistics.’ –Journal of Operational Research Society

‘There is a lot of very helpful in-line text explaining the concepts, and also giving many practical hints for particular situations…the style of presentation is very good, giving an impression that the book is a pleasure to read and relatively easy to understand…The book can definitely be very helpful for anyone who needs to know about statistics. I think that it may successfully be used as a course text…I think I may recommend it also as a text for additional or, maybe better yet., after-reading for students who follow a classical statistics course.’ –Journal of the Operational Research Society

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

MICHAEL WOOD is a Lecturer at Portsmouth University. He has taught statistics and related areas to undergraduates, postgraduate and research students in a range of disciplines, and to participants on short courses for business organizations. He has published widely on statistics and research methods, business and management, and education.