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Essay / Research Paper Abstract
This 3 page paper explains each of these types of statistics and provides examples. Bibliography lists 2 sources.
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3 pages (~225 words per page)
File: ME12_PGsttdif.rtf
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Unformatted sample text from the term paper:
information in a better way. We could, for example, determine the mean score of test results or we could use more sophisticated statistical methods to gain an understanding of complex
data. There are two branches in the field of statistics, each of which has its own goals and formulas. These branches are descriptive statistics and inferential statistics. Descriptive statistics
analyzes an entire population. This means that the researcher is looking at everyone that is in that population. That means that everyone who fits into that defined population is included
in the statistical analysis (AllPsych, 2004; Laerd Statistics, n.d.). An example would be a fourth grade class; every student in that particular class would be included in the data set.
There is one goal with descriptive statistics which is to summarize, organize and analyze the data from this population (AllPsych, 2004). There are two goals with inferential statistics. The first
goal is to determine what might be happening in a specific population based on a sample of that population (AllPsych, 2004; Laerd Statistics, n.d.). Returning to the fourth grade class,
if we were to include 25 of the 30 students to determining an average score, we would be using inferential statistics. We are inferring a conclusion from a sample. The
second goal is to estimate, forecast or predict what might happen in the future. Inferential statistics always uses a sample or a part of the population and descriptive statistics
always includes the entire population. Another way to understand the difference is that descriptive describes and inferential infers. The only conclusions that can be made in descriptive statistics is about
the specific population included. Inferential statistics do draw conclusions beyond the subjects included in the actual research. In most research studies, the investigators report both the data gained from
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