HTHSCI 2S03 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Continuous Or Discrete Variable, Collectively Exhaustive Events, Random Variable
3 Mar 2017
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Document Summary
Descriptive statistics: the collection, organization, summarization, and presentation of data. Inferential statistics: the drawing of inferences about a larger group of data from a sample of the data. Data: the raw material of statistics (cid:840)usually numbers, doesn"t have to be(cid:841) - 2 types of numbers in stats is measurements and counting. Variable: characteristic that takes on different values in different persons, places, or things; e. g. weight, religion. A dependent variable is the outcome of interest, which should change in response to some intervention. A independent variable may be the intervention, what is being manipulated, or any variable that may have an effect on the dependent variable. A quantitative variable is one that can be measured, for example, height, blood pressure, weight, age. A qualitative variable cannot be measured and should be categorized, for example, gender, color of hair, ethnic group. A discrete variable has values that can assume only whole numbers; examples: eye colour, head hairs lost, hospital visits.
