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Descriptive Statistics

Descriptive statistics are used to describe basic features of data through simple summaries. They provide an overview of a sample rather than making inferences about a broader population. Descriptive statistics summarize data in a manageable form through measures like averages, while accounting for limitations like losing detail. Univariate analysis examines one variable at a time through its distribution, central tendency, and dispersion within a sample. The distribution shows the frequency of individual values or ranges of values for a variable.

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427 views2 pages

Descriptive Statistics

Descriptive statistics are used to describe basic features of data through simple summaries. They provide an overview of a sample rather than making inferences about a broader population. Descriptive statistics summarize data in a manageable form through measures like averages, while accounting for limitations like losing detail. Univariate analysis examines one variable at a time through its distribution, central tendency, and dispersion within a sample. The distribution shows the frequency of individual values or ranges of values for a variable.

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Descriptive Statistics

Descriptive statistics are used to describe the basic features of the data in a study.
They provide simple summaries about the sample and the measures. Together with
simple graphics analysis, they form the basis of virtually every quantitative analysis
of data.

Descriptive statistics are typically distinguished from inferential statistics. With


descriptive statistics you are simply describing what is or what the data s hows. With
inferential statistics, you are trying to reach conclusions that extend beyond the
immediate data alone. For instance, we use inferential statistics to try to infer from
the sample data what the population might think. Or, we use inferential sta tistics to
make judgments of the probability that an observed difference between groups is a
dependable one or one that might have happened by chance in this study. Thus, we
use inferential statistics to make inferences from our data to more general
conditions; we use descriptive statistics simply to describe what’s going on in our
data.

Descriptive Statistics are used to present quantitative descriptions in a manageable


form. In a research study we may have lots of measures. Or we may measure a
large number of people on any measure. Descriptive statistics help us to simplify
large amounts of data in a sensible way. Each descriptive statistic reduces lots of
data into a simpler summary. For instance, consider a simple number used to
summarize how well a batter is performing in baseball, the batting average. This
single number is simply the number of hits divided by the number of times at bat
(reported to three significant digits). A batter who is hitting .333 is getting a hit one
time in every three at bats. One batting .250 is hitting one time in four. The single
number describes a large number of discrete events. Or, consider the scourge of
many students, the Grade Point Average (GPA). This single number describes the
general performance of a student across a potentially wide range of course
experiences.

Every time you try to describe a large set of observations with a single indicator you
run the risk of distorting the original data or losing important detail. The batting
average doesn’t tell you whether the batter is hitting home runs or singles. It doesn’t
tell whether she’s been in a slump or on a streak. The GPA doesn’t tell you whether
the student was in difficult courses or easy ones, or whether they were courses in
their major field or in other disciplines. Even given these limitations, descriptive
statistics provide a powerful summary that may enable comparisons across people
or other units.
Univariate Analysis

Univariate analysis involves the examination across cases of one variable at a time.
There are three major characteristics of a single variable that we tend to look at:

 the distribution
 the central tendency
 the dispersion

In most situations, we would describe all three of these characteristics for each of
the variables in our study.

The Distribution

The distribution is a summary of the frequency of individual values or ranges of


values for a variable. The simplest distribution would list every value of a variable
and the number of persons who had each value. For instance, a typical way to
describe the distribution of college students is by year in college, listing the number
or percent of students at each of the four years. Or, we describe gender by listing
the number or percent of males and females. In these cases, the variable has few
enough values that we can list each one and summarize how many sample cases
had the value. But what do we do for a variable like income or GPA? With these
variables there can be a large number of possible values, with relatively few people
having each one. In this case, we group the raw scores into categories according to
ranges of values. For instance, we might look at GPA according to the letter grade
ranges. Or, we might group income into four or five ranges of income values.

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