Resource Library

A judicious man uses statistics, not to get knowledge, but to save himself from having ignorance foisted upon him. A quote of Scottish satirist and historian Thomas Carlyle (1795 - 1881) from "Chartism, Chapter II" written in 1839. A fuller version of the quote appears in "Statistically Speaking: A dictionary of quotations" compiled by Carl Gaither and Alma Cavazos-Gaither.

A cartoon to teach about how researchers usually hope to find differences between treatment and control (or do they?). Cartoon by John Landers (www.landers.co.uk) based on an idea from Dennis Pearl (The Ohio State University). Free to use in the classroom and on course web sites.

A cartoon to teach about data management issues. Cartoon by John Landers (www.landers.co.uk) based on an idea from Dennis Pearl (The Ohio State University). Free to use in the classroom and on course web sites.

A cartoon to teach about probability calculations based on statistical models. Cartoon by John Landers (www.landers.co.uk) based on an idea from Dennis Pearl (The Ohio State University). Free to use in the classroom and on course web sites.

A cartoon to teach about the value of a Placebo in experiments. Cartoon by John Landers (www.landers.co.uk) based on an idea from Dennis Pearl (The Ohio State University). Free to use in the classroom and on course web sites.

This page helps readers know which statistcal tests are appropriate for the different types of data. Two charts display the information. A discussion of study design and sample size, as well as exercise questions with solutions are also provided.

This lesson poses a series of questions designed to challenge students' possible misconceptions of statistical inference and hypothesis testing. The lesson uses the statistical software, Fathom, and three datasets with information on the number of chips per canister distributed by a snack maker. The data can found at the relation address below.

This textbook for medical statistics covers many topics such as: Data display and summary; Mean and standard deviation; Populations and samples; Statements of probability and confidence intervals; Differences between means: type I and type II errors and power; Differences between percentages and paired alternatives; The t tests; The chi-squared tests; Exact probabilty test; Rank score tests; Correlation and regression; Survival analysis; Study design and choosing a statistical test.

This site presents may articles on current events and issues that challenge statistics reported in the news. Each article encourages readers to think critically about statistics reported by the media and to look at the whole picture before believing conclusions presented in the news. "Our goals are to correct scientific misinformation in the media resulting from bad science, politics, or a simple lack of information or knowledge."

A statistician's wife had twins. He was delighted. He rang the minister who was also delighted. "Bring them to church on Sunday and we'll baptize them," said the minister. "No," replied the statistician. "Baptize one. We'll keep the other as a control." This is joke number 30 on Gary Ramseyer's First Internet Gallery of Statistics Jokes at http://www.ilstu.edu/~gcramsey/Gallery.html