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Statistical Reasoning for Everyday Life, 6th edition

Published by Pearson (June 9, 2023) © 2024

  • Jeff Bennett University of Colorado at Boulder
  • William L. Briggs University of Colorado Denver
  • Mario F. Triola Dutchess Community College
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Whether you are planning for your financial future, starting a new business, or simply following the news, statistical reasoning is a part of daily life. It comes up in everything from opinion polls to economic reports to the latest research in many fields. Statistical Reasoning for Everyday Life uses real-life examples to help you understand the statistics needed for your college courses, to reason with statistical information in your career, and to evaluate and make everyday decisions. The authors approach each concept qualitatively, using computation techniques only to enhance your understanding and build on ideas as they work up to real examples and complex case studies. The 6th Edition updates discussions and examples throughout, revising or replacing many examples and case studies to reflect the latest data and topics. 

How to Succeed in Your Statistics Course

Applications Index

1. Speaking of Statistics

  • 1.1 What Is/Are Statistics?
  • 1.2 Sampling
  • 1.3 Types of Statistical Studies
  • 1.4 Should You Believe a Statistical Study?
  • FOCUS ON PSYCHOLOGY: Are You Driving “Drunk” on Your Cell Phone?
  • FOCUS ON PUBLIC HEALTH: Is Your Lifestyle Healthy?
  • FOCUS ON THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC: Why Is Statistics Critical to Understanding the Pandemic?

2. Measurement in Statistics

  • 2.1 Data Types and Levels of Measurement
  • 2.2 Dealing with Errors
  • 2.3 Uses of Percentages in Statistics
  • 2.4 Index Numbers
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Inflation Calculator
  • FOCUS ON POLITICS: Who Benefits Most from a Tax Cut?
  • FOCUS ON ECONOMICS: What is the “Chained” CPI, and Why Does It Matter?
  • FOCUS ON THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC: Was Remote Learning a Viable Substitute for In-Person Classes?

3. Visual Displays of Data

  • 3.1 Frequency Tables
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Frequency Tables
  • 3.2 Picturing Distributions of Data
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Bar Graphs
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Pie Charts
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Line Charts and Histograms
  • 3.3 Graphics in the Media
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Graphs with Multiple Data Sets
  • 3.4 A Few Cautions about Graphics
  • FOCUS ON HISTORY: Can War Be Described with a Graph?
  • FOCUS ON THE ENVIRONMENT: How Much Is the Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide Concentration Changing? 

4. Describing Data

  • 4.1 What Is Average?
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Mean, Median, and Mode
  • 4.2 Shapes of Distributions
  • 4.3 Measures of Variation
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Quartiles
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Boxplots
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Standard Deviation
  • 4.4 Statistical Paradoxes
  • FOCUS ON THE STOCK MARKET: What's Average about the Dow?
  • FOCUS ON ECONOMICS: Are the Rich Getting Richer?

5. A Normal World

  • 5.1 What Is Normal?
  • 5.2 Properties of the Normal Distribution
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Standard Scores and Percentiles
  • 5.3 The Central Limit Theorem
  • FOCUS ON EDUCATION: What Can We Learn from SAT Trends?
  • FOCUS ON PSYCHOLOGY: Are We Smarter Than Our Parents?
  • FOCUS ON CLIMATE CHANGE: How Much Hotter Is the New “Normal”?

6. Probability in Statistics

  • 6.1 The Role of Probability in Statistics: Statistical Significance
  • 6.2 Basics of Probability
  • 6.3 The Law of Large Numbers
  • 6.4 Ideas of Risk and Life Expectancy
  • 6.5 Combining Probabilities (Supplementary Section)
  • FOCUS ON SOCIAL SCIENCE: Do Lotteries Harm People with Lower Incomes?
  • FOCUS ON LAW: Is DNA Analysis Reliable?

7. Correlation and Causality

  • 7.1 Seeking Correlation
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Scatterplots and Correlation Coefficients
  • 7.2 Interpreting Correlations
  • 7.3 Best-Fit Lines and Prediction
  • 7.4 The Search for Causality
  • FOCUS ON EDUCATION: What Helps Children Learn to Read?
  • FOCUS ON CLIMATE CHANGE: What Is Causing Global Warming (and What Can We Do About It)? 

8. Inferences from Samples to Populations

  • 8.1 Sampling Distributions
  • 8.2 Estimating Population Means
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Confidence Interval for a Population Mean
  • 8.3 Estimating Population Proportions
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Confidence Interval for a Population Proportion
  • FOCUS ON HISTORY: Where Did Statistics Begin?
  • FOCUS ON LITERATURE: How Many Words Did Shakespeare Know?

9. Hypothesis Testing

  • 9.1 Fundamentals of Hypothesis Testing
  • 9.2 Hypothesis Tests for Population Means
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Hypothesis Test for a Population Mean
  • 9.3 Hypothesis Tests for Population Proportions
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Hypothesis Test for a Population Proportion
  • FOCUS ON HEALTH AND EDUCATION: Will Your Education Help You Live Longer?
  • FOCUS ON AGRICULTURE: Are Genetically Modified Foods Safe?

10. t Tests, Two-Way Tables, and ANOVA

  • 10.1 t Distribution for Inferences about a Mean
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Confidence Intervals Using the t Distribution
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Hypothesis Tests with the t Distribution
  • 10.2 Hypothesis Testing with Two-Way Tables
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Hypothesis Testing with Two-Way Tables
  • 10.3 Analysis of Variance (One-Way ANOVA)
  • USING TECHNOLOGY: Analysis of Variance
  • FOCUS ON CRIMINOLOGY: Can You Tell a Fraud When You See One?
  • FOCUS ON EDUCATION: What Can a Fourth-Grader Do with Statistics?
  • FOCUS ON THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC: Have Covid Vaccines Really Saved Lives?
  • Epilogue: A Perspective on Statistics

Appendices

A: z-Score Tables
B: Table of Random Numbers

Websites and Suggested Readings

Glossary

Credits

Answers

Index

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