Comprehending Behavioral Statistics (with CD-ROM) [Hardcover]

Russell T. Hurlburt (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 17, 2005 | ISBN-10: 053460627X | ISBN-13: 978-0534606275 | Edition: 4

An unbeatable combination that will appeal to any learning style! Packaged with the free Personal Trainer CD-ROM, COMPREHENDING BEHAVIORAL STATISTICS makes statistics appealing and approachable to students with a variety of learning styles and backgrounds. Students who learn best by READING find Hurlburt's explanations-which have been crafted and revised based on his own students' feedback-to be exceptionally clear. Students who learn better by LISTENING find the audio/visual "lectlets" on the accompanying Personal Trainer CD-ROM invaluable. Covering each topic in the text, the lectlets include interactive review questions with immediate feedback that engage students who learn best by INTERACTING. For VISUAL learners, the text includes more than 400 illustrations (twice as many as most texts), as well as Hurlburt's free ESTAT software on the accompanying CD-ROM. ESTAT is a unique program that allows students to practice the eyeball-estimation of basic concepts so that they can understand at a deeper level the statistics they are computing. Faculty appreciate the textbook's accuracy and focus on timely topics as well as its innovative pedagogy: Hurlburt uses a progressive, cumulative integration and review of concepts so students keep fundamental concepts "fresh" as they progress through the course.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Russell T. Hurlburt, Ph.D. has been at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas since 1976. Prior to arriving at UNLV, he completed a clinical psychology internship at Connecticut's Newtown State Hospital. He received his Ph.D. in clinical psychology from the University of South Dakota after a B.S. in engineering from Princeton. Hurlburt's areas of interest include the teaching of introductory statistics: Dr. Hurlburt has developed "eyeball estimation" techniques for comprehending the concepts of statistics, and he's incorporated them into his textbooks and computer-aided instructional programs. His clinical psychology and engineering backgrounds make him ideally situated to write about introductory statistics with accuracy and sensitivity. Dr. Hurlburt is also one of the pioneers of "thought sampling," the use of beepers to trigger the random sampling of thoughts and feelings in participants' own natural environments. He is the originator of the "descriptive experience sampling method," which provides qualitative, idiographic descriptions of inner experience. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 566 pages
• Publisher: Wadsworth Publishing; 4 edition (June 17, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 053460627X
• ISBN-13: 978-0534606275
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 8 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.9 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #469,021 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great use of graphing... would teach with it again., January 3, 2009

By 

Anne T. Gilman (Schenectady, NY USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Comprehending Behavioral Statistics (with CD-ROM) (Hardcover)

This book is both comprehensive and realistic (e.g. the author recognizes that introductory students can handle interval and ratio data similarly). I have taught one semester of intro stats using this textbook. I'll need several more semesters before I truly feel comfortable teaching it, but I can give a preliminary report on the book:

Best part: The eyeballing techniques. The formulas behind behavioral statistics are far from simple, but the distinctions they make are related to quantitative analyses (visual and otherwise) which the students already know how to perform. Can you balance a flat ruler on a pencil? Can you tell Pigpen from Charlie Brown? If so, you can see in the data some of the distinctions that we make with measures of central tendency (like averages) and of variation.

2nd best part: The audio CD. As another reviewer suggested, it's not slick, it won't make any radio charts, okay, but it's the author putting each of the core concepts in perspective. Hurlburt is a good writer, even with the rough spots I note below, and his prose looks daunting to some introductory-level students. I don't know if more than a few of my students tried the CD, but it definitely helped a few of them get more out of the book.

Rough patches: The Student's t distribution is snuck in somewhat abruptly, in comparison to other explanations. There are also a few paragraphs in the ANOVA chapter which many of my students found indigestible, and with reason. And likely no one else will care, but some of the data sets presented say precisely whether they are simulated or actual data -- why don't they all?

More good stuff: The author does not think that everyone on earth longs to be a statistician. (Another intro textbook I considered bases its entire discussion of ANOVA on degrees of freedom, which is no doubt mathematically sound, but I had to laugh, since so many of us in the graduate program were still stumbling on that concept! Group means are a little more broadly understood.) In this book, it takes a second to figure out the answer index, but after that you're fine, and the exercises offered follow the lessons well.

If the publisher would produce power points with the graphs from the book and give the author some time and maybe 5 more pages to improve the occasional rough patches, this text would be more useful and probably more widely used.

5.0 out of 5 stars Fast and great to work with, September 11, 2011

By 

Austin Sara - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Comprehending Behavioral Statistics (with CD-ROM) (Hardcover)

Book came quickly. When I needed the forgotten CD, they worked fast to remedy and CD arrived within 3 days.
No problems. Would use them again.

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Introduction to Behavioral Statistics, March 11, 2006

By 

naiaspirit "naiaspirit" (Missoula,, MT United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Comprehending Behavioral Statistics (with CD-ROM) (Hardcover)

I was truly fearful of statistics but I think this book saved me. I thought the textbook was readable, had excellent examples, the terms were clear and the text is written in an applied way. The people who rated this text harshly would not have been pleased with any stats text,after all it is stats...what math is not dry. HELLOOOO!?