SECTION 1.6 - TWO BRANCHES OF STATISTICS: DESCRIPTIVE AND INFERENTIAL

Select all that apply. Descriptive statistics A. allow random assignment to experimental conditions. B. use data from a sample to answer questions about a population. C. summarize and describe data. D. allow you to generalize beyond the data at hand.

The correct answer is only C. Descriptive statistics summarize and describe data. Inferential statistics use data from a sample to answer questions about a population. Inferential statistics involves generalizing beyond the data at hand.

Generalizing

using information from a sample and assuming it is also true for the population of interest. Also known as generalization.

Which of the following are descriptive statistics (check all that apply)? A. The mean age of onset of Bipolar disorder. B. The number of people who were considered mentally ill in the year 1983. C. A prediction of next month's suicide rate. D. The median price of anti-anxiety drugs. E. The IQ of the smartest woman in the world.

The correct answers are A, B, D, and E. C is the only incorrect answer. Descriptive statistics are numbers that are used to summarize and describe data. That is what A, B, D, and E do. Answer choice C "Predicting next month's suicide rate" involves generalizing beyond the data at hand, which is inferential statistics.

Two basic divisions of statistics are A. inferential and descriptive. B. population and sample. C. sampling and scaling. D. mean and median.

The answer is A. The two branches of statistics are inferential and descriptive.

Inferential statistics

statistical techniques that draw conclusions about a population from a sample.

Descriptive statistics

statistical techniques that summarize, organize, and simplify the data.