Introduction to

STATISTICS
Biostatistics
Week 1

1
Content
1.1 What is Statistics
1.2 Descriptive and Inferential Statistics
1.3 Variables and Types of Data
1.4 Data Collection and Sampling
Techniques
1.5 Observational and Experimental Studies

2
Objectives
By the end of this chapter, you should be able to

 Demonstrate knowledge of statistical terms. (1.1)

 Differentiate between the two branches of statistics. (1.2)

 Identify types of data. (1.3)

 Identify the measurement level for each variable. (1.3)

 Identify the four basic sampling techniques. (1.4)

 Explain the difference between an observational and an experimental

study. (1.5)

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1.1: What is Statistics?
Most people become familiar with probability and statistics
through radio, television, newspapers, and magazines. For
example, the following statements were found in newspapers.
• Only 2 out of 11864 National Service dodgers have been hailed to the court
• Based on the 2000 census, 40.5 million households have two vehicles.
• The average annual salary for a professional football player for the year
2001 was $1,100,500.

• The average cost of a wedding dress is nearly 50,000.

• In USA, the median salary for men with a bachelor’s degree is $49,982,
while the median salary for women with a bachelor’s degree is $35,408.

• Based on a survey of 250,000 individual auto leases signed from March 1

through April 15, 2002, 73% were for a Jaguar.

• Women who eat fish once a week are 29% less likely to develop heart
4
disease.
 Is STATISTICS important in our life?
Various uses of Statistics
 Statistics is used in almost all fields of human endeavor.

 In sports,
 statistician may keep records of the number of yards a running back gains during
a football game, or the number of hits a baseball player gets in a season.

 In public health
 an administrator might be concerned with the number of residents who contract a
new strain of flu virus during a certain year.

 In education
 A researcher want to know if new methods of teaching are better than old ones.

 Furthermore, statistics is used to analyze the results of surveys and as a

tool in scientific research to make decisions based on controlled
experiments.

 Other uses of statistics include operations research, quality control,

estimation, and prediction. 5
Why you should study STATISTICS?
1. Students, like professional people, must be able to read and understand
the various statistical studies performed in their fields. To have this
understanding, they must be knowledgeable about the vocabulary,
symbols, concepts, and statistical procedures used in these studies.

2. Students and professional people may be called on to conduct research

in their fields, since statistical procedures are basic to research. To
accomplish this, they must be able to design experiments; collect,
organize, analyze, and summarize data; and possibly make reliable
predictions or forecasts for future use. They must also be able to
communicate the results of the study in their own words.

3. Students and professional people can also use the knowledge gained
from studying statistics to become better consumers and citizens. For
example, they can make intelligent decisions about what products to
purchase based on consumer studies about government spending based
on utilization studies, and so on.
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  Statistics is the
branch of science
that deals with the
collecting, organizing,
summarizing,
analyzing, presenting,
interpreting and
drawing conclusions
from data.

Any values (observations or

measurements) that have been collected
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 The basic idea behind all statistical methods of data analysis is to make
inferences about a population by studying small sample chosen from it

Population Parameter
The complete collection of A number that describes a
measurements, outcomes, objects population characteristic
or individuals under study

Sample Statistic
A subset of a population,
A number that describes a sample
containing the objects or outcomes
characteristic
that are actually observed

Example: A researcher wants to determine the average income of the residents

of a certain barangay and there are 2,000 residents in the barangay. Then all of
these residents comprise the population, and is usually denoted by N.
Therefore, N = 2,000.
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1.2 Descriptive & Inferential Statistics
Descriptive statistics
 consists of the collection,
organization, classification,
summarization, and
presentation of data obtain
from the sample.
 Used to describe the
characteristics of the sample
 Used to determine whether
the sample represent the
target population by
comparing sample statistic
and population parameter
Inferential statistics
 consists of generalizing from
samples to populations,
performing estimations
hypothesis testing, determining
relationships among variables,
and making predictions.
 Used when we want to draw a
conclusion for the data we
obtained from the sample
 Used to describe, infer,
estimate, approximate the
characteristics of the target
population 9
Descriptive vs. Inferential
Statistics
 Tell whether the following make use of descriptive or
inferential statistics:
 A teacher computes the average grade of her students
then determines the top ten students.
 A psychologist investigates if there is a significant
relationship between mental age and chronological
age.
 A manager of a business firm predicts future sales of
the company based on the present sales.
 A janitor counts the number of various furniture inside
the school.
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An overview of descriptive
statistics and statistical inference
START

Gathering of
Data

Classification,
Summarization, and
Processing of data

Presentation and

Descriptive Communication of
Summarized information

Statistics
Yes
Is Information from a Yes Use sample information
to make inferences about
sample?
the population Statistical
Statistical
Inference

No No
Descripti
ve
Draw conclusions about
Inference
Statistics Use cencus data to
the population
analyze the population
characteristic (parameter)
characteristic under study
under study

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STOP
1.3 Variables and Types of Data
To gain knowledge about seemingly haphazard events,
statisticians collect information for variables, which
describe the event.

Variables

•is a characteristic or attribute that can assume different values.

•is also a characteristics of interest, one that can be expressed

as a number that is possessed by each item under study.

•The value of this characteristic is likely to change or vary from

one item in the data set to the next.

Variables whose values are determined by chance

are called random variables 12
Data are also the values that variables can assume.
A data set is a collection of data values.
Each value in the data set is called a data value or a datum.

Variables can be
classified

As Quantitative and By how they are

Qualitative categorized, counted
or measured
- Level of
measurements of data
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 Qualitative
Nominal Data (can’t be rank)
(categorical/Attributes) Gender, race, citizenship. ext
1* Data that refers only to Use code
numbers (1,
2,…)
name classification (done
using numbers) Ordinal Data (can be rank)
Feeling (dislike – like),
2* Can be placed into color (dark – bright) , ext
distinct categories
according to some
Types
of Data characteristic or attribute.
Discrete Variables
Quantitative Assume values that can be
counted and finite
(Numerical) Ex : no of something
1* Data that represent
counts or measurements Continuous variables
(can be count or measure) Can assume all values
between any two specific
2* Are numerical in nature values & it obtained by
and can be ordered or measuring
ranked. Ex: weight, age, salary, height,
temperature, ext 14
Level of Measurements of Data
Nominal-level Ordinal-level Interval-level Ratio-level
data data data data
classifies data classifies data ranks data, and Possesses all the
into mutually into categories precise characteristics of
exclusive (non that can be differences interval
overlapping), ranked; between units of measurement,
exhausting however, precise measure do exist; and there exists a
categories in differences however, there is true zero.
which no order or between the no meaningful
ranking can be ranks do not zero
imposed on the exist
data

Examples

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 Example

1. A meteorologist classifies cities as having winter weather that is “dreary”

(0) or “not dreary” (1). Type of winter weather (0 vs. 1) is measured at
what level of measurement?
2. A neurologist measures how many times per minute a specific neuron in
the brain “fires” when a person is in dim light as opposed to when a
person is in bright light. She is measuring the neuron firing at what level
of measurement?
3. A social worker obtains suicide rates for students at colleges. If the
college has a suicide rate that is below average, it classifies a – 1. If the
suicide rate is average, the college gets a 0; and if the suicide rate is ,
above average, it gets a +1. Suicide rate (– 1, 0, 1) is being measured at
what level of measurement?
4. Classify each of the measurements as quantitative, ordinal or categorical:
a. Response to treatment coded as 1 = no response, 2 = minor
improvement, 3 = major improvement, 4 = complete recovery
b. Annual income
c. Body temperature (degree Celsius)
d. Area of a parcel of land (acres)
e. Population density of people
f. Political party affiliation coded 1 = Democrat, 2 = Republican, 3 = Ind.;
4 = Other 16
1.4 Data Collection and
Sampling Techniques
Method of Data
Collection

Data that are made Data resulting from an

available by others experiment
(secondary data) (experimental study)

Data collected in an
observational study
(survey/ questionnaires)
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4 Sampling Techniques
 Random samples
 Selected using chance method or random methods

 Systematic samples
 Numbering each subject of the populations & select every kth
number

 Stratified samples
 Dividing the population into groups according some
characteristic that is important to the study, then sampling from
each group

 Cluster samples
 Dividing the population into sections/clusters, then randomly
select some of those cluster & then chose all members from
those selected cluster

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 Identify the type of sampled obtain

Example 1
A physical education professor wants to study the
physical fitness levels of students at her university. There are
20,000 students enrolled at the university, and she wants to draw
a sample of size 100 to take a physical fitness test. She obtains a
list of all 20,000 students, numbered it from 1 to 20,000 and then
invites the 100 students corresponding to those numbers to
participate in the study. Is this a simple random sample?

Example 2
A quality engineer wants to inspect rolls of wallpaper in order
to obtain information on the rate at which flows in the printing are
occurring. She decides to draw a sample of 50 rolls of wallpaper from
a day’s production. Each hour for 5 hours, she takes the 10 most
recently produced rolls and counts the number of flaws on each. Is
this a simple random sample?

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 Example 3

Suppose we have a list of 1000 registered voters in a community and we

want to pick a probability sample of 50. We can use a random number table to
pick one of the first 20 voters (1000/50 = 20) on our list. If the table gave us the
number of 16, the 16th voter on the list would be the first to be selected. We
would then pick every 20th name after this random start (the 36th voter, the 56th
voter, etc) to produce a systematic sample.

Example 4

Consumer surveys of large cities often employ cluster sampling. The

usual procedure is to divide a map of the city into small blocks each blocks
containing a cluster are surveyed. A number of clusters are selected for the
sample, and all the households in a cluster are surveyed. Using a cluster
sampling can reduce cost and time. Less energy and money are expended if an
interviewer stays within a specific area rather than traveling across stretches of
the cities.

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 Example 5

Suppose our population is a university student body. We

want to estimate the average annual expenditures of a college
student for non school items. Assume we know that, because of
different lifestyles, juniors and seniors spend more than freshmen
and sophomores, but there are fewer students in the upper classes
than in the lower classes because of some dropout factor. To
account for this variation in lifestyle and group size, the population
of student can easily be stratified into freshmen, sophomores,
junior and seniors. A sample can be stratum and each result
weighted to provide an overall estimate of average non school
expenditures.

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1.5 Observational and Experimental
Studies (Types of statistical studies)

 Example
 In an  data from the Motorcycle Industry
observational
Council (USA TODAY) stated that
study, the
“Motorcycle owners are getting older
researcher merely
and richer.” Data were collected on the
observes what is
ages and incomes of motorcycle
happening or
owners for the years 1980 and 1998
what has
and then compared. The findings
happened in the
showed considerable differences in the
past and tries to
ages and incomes of motorcycle
draw conclusions
owners for the two years. In this study,
based on these
the researcher merely observed what
observations.
had happened to the motorcycle
owners over a period of time. There
was no type of research intervention.
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  Example
 In an experimental
study, the researcher
manipulates one of
the variables and tries
to determine how the
manipulation
influences other
variables.
 the subjects should
be assigned to groups
randomly.
 Also, the treatments
should be assigned to
the groups at random.
 a study conducted at Virginia Polytechnic
Institute and presented in Psychology
Today divided female undergraduate
students into two groups and had the
students perform as many sit-ups as
possible in 90 sec. The first group was told
only to “Do your best,” while the second
group was told to try to increase the actual
number of sit-ups they did each day by
10%. After 4 days, the subjects in the group
that were given the vague instructions to
“Do your best” averaged 43 sit-ups, while
the group that was given the more specific
instructions to increase the number of sit-
ups by 10% averaged 56 sit-ups by the last
day’s session. The conclusion then was
that athletes who were given specific goals
perform better than those who were not
given specific goals.
 This study is an example of a statistical
experiment since the researchers
intervened in the study by manipulating one
of the variables, namely, the type of
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instructions given to each group.
 Statistical studies usually include one or more independent
variables and one dependent variable.

The independent variable in an experimental study is the

one that is being manipulated by the
researcher. The independent variable is also called the
explanatory variable.

The resultant variable is called the dependent variable or the

outcome variable.

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 Summary
 The two major areas of statistics are descriptive and inferential.

 When the populations to be studied are large, statisticians use subgroups

called samples.

 The four basic methods for obtaining samples are: random, systematic,
stratified, and cluster.

 Data can be classified as qualitative or quantitative.

 The four basic types of measurement are nominal, ordinal, interval, and ratio.

 The two basic types of statistical studies are observational and experimental.

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 Conclusion
 The applications of statistics are many and
varied. People encounter them in everyday life,
such as in reading newspapers or magazines,
listening to the radio, or watching television.

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Thank you