This course presents important tools of descriptive statistics and their effective use. It reviews crucial elements of probability theory and builds on those elements to present important techniques of inferential statistics, with particular emphasis on linear regression, both with single and multiple independent variables. The course covers many topics in multiple regression, including dummy variables, interaction terms, curvilinear regression, and collinearity. Throughout the course, stress is placed both on students a) using Excel to do statistical analysis and b) providing explanations of the analysis they do.
- Homework expectations
A. It’s fine to work with others on homework, but write each answer and explanation on your own.
B. Begin each answer on a new sheet. If possible, fit each answer onto a single sheet. Handwritten answers are fine, as long as they are legible.
C. Arrange each assignment sequentially, with each part clearly labeled. For example, Problem 1) should come before Problem 2) and part 2)a) should come before part 2)b).
D. Show your work and present answers with three significant digits.
E. Present each numerical answer with a sentence. For example, rather than “1/36,” your answer might be, “The chance of rolling a two is 1/36th.”
F. Unless you are going to miss class, turn in homework on paper. If you are going to miss class, email me the homework as an Excel workbook before class begins. Your answers should be on the first worksheet, formatted to print with a single print command.
G. One important part of this class is numerical literacy. One aspect of numerical literacy is writing well. Please try to answer questions with complete, clear, gramatical sentences. - Useful links
- Course syllabus for Fall 2009
- Excel Skills Presumed
The (very basic) skills you should have before the first day of class. - Excel skills for class
- An online tutorial teaching Excel skills.
- The website that goes with our text
- The place to go to download PhStat2 and the text’s data.
- The best graph of all time (by Charles Minard)
A depiction of the size of Napoleon Bonaparte’s armies invading Russia in 1812. The tan path represents his attack and the black path his retreat. - Regression with a natural log transformation
- Java applets to help you learn important concepts
- Recommended practice problems (and their answers)
- Materials for the inferential statistics paper
- Assignment sheet from Fall 2008
- Rubric from Fall 2008 The rubric is pre-scored for a perfect paper (each dimension is scored 5).
- Model papers with brief comments
- Pamplin School writing handbook
- Web sites providing access to data
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