Your Statistical Consultant: Answers to Your Data Analysis Questions [Paperback]

Rae R. Newton (Author), Kjell E. (Erik) Rudestam (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0803958234 | ISBN-13: 978-0803958234 | Publication Date: February 12, 1999 | Edition: 1

Do you ever feel at a loss on how to proceed with a particular set of data? Your Statistical Consultant can provide the answer. This comprehensive guide introduces, describes, and makes recommendations regarding difficult statistical problems and techniques. The authors discuss common problems by addressing frequently asked questions; provide a conceptual overview of topics and techniques; give accounts of such new-found topics as the debate over statistical significance, effect sizes and meta-analysis; and highlight and explain key terms and points.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"I wish I had owned this book in graduate school. Instead of searching for busy professors to answer my statistical questions, I could have obtained timely and easy-to-understand answers in the page of this well-written and user-friendly text."  (C. Keith Haddock )

"It is more than a reference work. It is a very well-written general work on statistics problems."  (W. Paul Vogt )

About the Author

Rae R. Newton is a Professor of Sociology at California State University-Fullerton and a Senior Statistician at the Child and Adolescent Health Services Research Center in San Diego, California.  He recieved his doctoral degree in sociology from the University of California, Santa Barbara, and postdoctoral training at Indiana University.  He is author of Your Statistical Consultant: Answers to Your Data Analysis Questions (with Kjell Rudestam) and numerous articles in professional journals.  His research interests include statistical analysis, particularly structural equation modeling, health services delivery, and family violence.

Product Details

• Paperback: 344 pages
• Publisher: Sage Publications, Inc; 1 edition (February 12, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0803958234
• ISBN-13: 978-0803958234
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.1 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #465,722 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars You NEED this book if you are working on a dissertation, April 25, 2004

By 

Joe Cimbak - See all my reviews

This review is from: Your Statistical Consultant: Answers to Your Data Analysis Questions (Paperback)

As social science researchers we want to know three things:

1. Can we detect a relationship?

2. Can we define the strength of the relationship? and

3. Can we cognitively make sense of the relationship?

Other authors touch on Statistical Power and leave you hanging. Newton and Rudestam open your eyes to something going on out there in the research world that is very leading edge. They expanded me statistically and brought me through a place I've NEVER been before. I think I've got a total of about 7 hours into it now!

We, social scientists love to focus on the Type I error...its like Type I diabetes, an epidemic! Newton and Rudestam (p. 83) say, "A finding of statistical signficance means only that the true population effect is probably NOT zero, but typically it is misunderstood as indicating that the study is of substantive significance. A finding that a study is not statistically significant means that we have insufficient evidence to conclude that an effect is present, but it is often misunderstood to mean that the absence of an effect has been demonstrated." Read that about 7 times until you get it and you can call yourself a statistician!

Newton and Rudestam (Chapter 4) go into some really DETAILED explanations of the issues of researchers being enamored with and stopping with simple Type I error analysis. They define a series of studies (p.71) and say, "Sadly, the literature offers copius evidence of how research studies in the social sciences are underpowered for detecting all but very large effects." In order to get to a good statistical power level of .8 or higher you have to have some big samples sometimes. It depends upon the effect size of the population itself which you are modelling.

Bottom line is this "One cannot conclude the findings are large or important based on the significance level." (Newton, Rudestam, p.88). What they go on to explain very well is that you have to know the power of your testing, you have to estimate the effect size, you have to know if you sample size gives you the power you need. If you don't, you are one of the social scientists who are apparently so enamored with Type I testing that, "...rejecting a null hypothesis is akin to rejecting the proposition that the moon is made of green cheese." (p. 87)

As you can tell, I needed this book for its treatise on Power. But, you will find a great deal of other gems in this book. The authors have made it a "one stop shop" for statistical questions. If you have had a bit more than a basic stat class and need to think through stats for research methods so that you won't be seen as an idiot by your scholarly community, BUT THIS BOOK and dog ear it. I am doing just that with it.

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Smart in your field but stupid in stats? BUY THIS BOOK., February 10, 2007

By 

Julesagogo (Michigan, USA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Your Statistical Consultant: Answers to Your Data Analysis Questions (Paperback)

I'm doing research in second language acquisition for my dissertation and have been struggling with everything related to statistics. It seems like every time I answer one question, three more pop up in its place. The statisticians I consulted with on campus were of no help because they couldn't translate their expertise into language that non-experts could understand, or they weren't familiar with more complex methods like general linear models. And I can only pester my dissertation advisor with stupid questions so many times. :) This book answers clearly and definitively almost all of the questions that I have posed to real, live statisticians and have not received satisfactory answers to. The title doesn't lie: it really is like your own, 24/7, personal consultant.

Some of the features that make this book so handy include a step-by-step worksheet/matrix for choosing statistical tests, followed by explanations of the assumptions and logic for each test plus issues in interpreting the results. The variety of clearly presented examples help to conceptualize difficult ideas and apply them to your own research. I'm almost 100% math-impaired, so I was stunned to understand the mathematical assumptions for each test that were described in the book. It also made clear for me for the first time how to interpret some of the graphs, plots and output charts that have confounded me in the past.

Before buying this book I was concerned that even it might be over my head because my exposure to statistics is limited to a two-week survey in a research methods class. However, the clarity and depth of the explanations in this book were just what I needed to deepen my understanding and allow me to use what I learned in my own research. I especially appreciate that the book concentrates on the most common questions that the authors have encountered about each test instead of providing too much information that serves no practical purpose.

My only complaint is that the book doesn't cover more "cutting-edge" (at least in my field) and complex tests like structural equation modeling (oddly, there is an entry for this topic in the index but no page number, and it is missing from the text). However, it covers everything that most grad student researchers will need to know about statistical tests.

If you are an educator or social scientist looking for guidance on applying the type of information contained in this book to anlayses using SPSS software, I also recommend "Doing Quantitative Research in Education with SPSS" by Daniel Muijs.

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Good book and very helpful, April 1, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Your Statistical Consultant: Answers to Your Data Analysis Questions (Paperback)

I had Rae Newton for the graduate methods course(s) at CSU Fullerton (502A and 502B). I have used this book many times to answer all of my questions (of course, when Dr. Newton was not available.) In short, I think this book should be used in all methods/stats classes. It really gets to the point and does not waste too much time with all of the formulas. I think it is meant to be used as a guide for non-math/statistics people who are using statistical packages like SPSS. It makes statistics understandable.