Statistics for the Behavioral and Social Sciences (2nd Edition)

Because today's statistics are done by computer, not by hand, and the majority of individuals in the social sciences are human- and word-oriented, not math and number oriented, this book offers a different approach to teaching statistics. Focusing on understanding, it emphasizes the intuitive, de-emphasizes the mathematical, and explains everything in clear, simple language. The book uses definitional formulas and encourages readers put words to what they know by writing essays rather than reciting formulas. The volume offers a comprehensive overview of key statistical concepts including the mean, variance, standard deviation, and z scores, correlation and prediction, key ingredients for inferential statistics: the normal curve, probability, and population versus sample and introduction to hypothesis testing, decision error, statistical power, and effect size, an introduction to the t test, analysis of variance, chi-square and strategies when population distributions are not normal and making sense of advanced statistical procedures in research articles.