Statistics, 4th Edition [Hardcover]

David Freedman (Author), Robert Pisani (Author), Roger Purves (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0393929728 | ISBN-13: 978-0393929720 | Publication Date: February 13, 2007 | Edition: 4th

Renowned for its clear prose and no-nonsense emphasis on core concepts, Statistics covers fundamentals using real examples to illustrate the techniques.

The Fourth Edition has been carefully revised and updated to reflect current data.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

David Freedman received his B.Sc. from McGill and his Ph.D. from Princeton. He has worked as a consultant for the City of San Francisco, the County of Los Angeles, the U.S. Department of Energy, and the U.S. Department of Justice. He has written several previous books and numerous technical papers. He is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and teaches at the University of California, Berkeley.


Robert Pisani received his B.A. and Ph.D. at the University of California, Berkeley. His research interests include probability models of market-price behavior and the statistical valuation of financial instruments.


Roger Purves received his B.A. at the University of British Columbia and his Ph.D. at the University of California, Berkeley, where he currently teaches. His research interests are in the mathematical foundations of probability theory.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 720 pages
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company; 4th edition (February 13, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0393929728
• ISBN-13: 978-0393929720
• Product Dimensions: 10.1 x 7.5 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.4 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (40 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #9,951 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

169 of 177 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A good start.., July 20, 2001

By 

Drew Balazs (Indianola, WA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Statistics, Third Edition (Hardcover)

If you are looking for a good (non-technical i.e. not involving higher math) introduction to statistics, this is the book for you. As a TA at Cal (Berkeley..Go Bears!), I worked for Roger Purves (one of the authors of the book) and I taught out of this book. Needless to say, I got to know the book rather well. I highly recommend it.

However, if you are looking for a slightly more advanced introduction to statistics/probability, I would suggest something along the lines of Probability by Jim Pitman or Mathematical Statistics and Data Analysis by John Rice. If you are really serious about probability theory, you might want to try Statistical Inference - by G. Casella and R.L. Berger.

42 of 42 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars great for a first course to non-statistics majors, February 12, 2008

By 

Michael R. Chernick "statman31147" (Holland PA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Statistics, Third Edition (Hardcover)

Many introductory statistics texts suffer from one of two ailments. Either they incorporate too much mathematics for non-statisticians or they provide oversimplified and sometimes incorrect explanations. This text is excellent and is favored by many statisticians who teach the introductory service course for non-statistics majors. The book provides excellent and insightful explanations. It is written by well-known Berkeley statisticians with great theoretical and applied experience, so it is not oversimplified or inaccurate. On the other hand Friedman and his co-authors took pains to minimize the necessary mathematics. It covers all the topics one would want to include in a first course. Real examples are used throughout to illustrate the value of the methods. These include clinical trials and observational studies, telephone surveys and opinion polls and some models in genetics.
Discussion of the data snooping issue is important, particularly as we move into an age where data mining is now feasible with current computing power.

46 of 48 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Buy this book and you won't regret it!, November 21, 2000

By 

macktheknife (Northern, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Statistics, Third Edition (Hardcover)

I had used this book for my Introduction to Statistics class, and I think it was the best $60 I had ever spent. The authors explain all the major statistical concepts clearly and succinctly, drawing on a variety of samples and adding a touch of humor. The math in this book is more than doable; anyone with a basic grasp of algebra and a willingness tackle numbers is the only prerequisite to understanding this book. However, the authors also try to convey to the reader that there is more to statistics than just numbers. How an experiment is constructed, how polls are taken, what biases exist, and how assumptions are made are all integral parts of statistics. This book is applicable to almost every subject--political science, sociology, sciences, engineering, etc. There are enough exercises in the chapters to assist the reader in reviewing the concepts. I can't stress this enough: Buy this book and you won't regret it!