Dr.
Soofia Iftikhar
BASIC UNIVARIATE
STATISTICAL METHODS
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By
Dr. Soofia Iftikhar
CONTENTS
Introduction
Variables
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Types of variables
Scales of measurement
Types of analysis
Components of univariate analysis
Advantages and limitations
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INTRODUCTION
The word “statistics” has several meanings:
data or numbers, the process of analyzing the
data, and the description of a field of study.
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A branch of mathematics dealing with the
collection, analysis, interpretation, and
presentation of masses of numerical data. A
collection of quantitative data
It is derived from the Latin word status,
meaning “manner of standing” or “position.”
Statistics were first used by tax assessors to
collect information for determining assets and 3
assessing taxes.
CONSTANT AND VARIABLES
Constant
A quantity which can assume only one value is called
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a constant. It is usually denoted by the first letters of
the alphabet, a, b, c
For example: The value of π=22/7=3.14159 and the
value of e=2.71828
Variable
A quantity which can vary from one individual or
object to another is called a variable. It is usually
denoted by the last letters of the alphabet, x,y,z
For example: Heights and weights of students, 4
income, temperature, number of children in a family,
etc.
TYPES OF VARIABLES
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SCALES OF MEASUREMENT
Nominal
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Ordinal
Interval
Ratio
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Nominal scale
A nominal scale is the 1st level of measurement scale in which
the numbers serve as “tags” or “labels” to classify or identify the
objects. A nominal scale usually deals with the non-numeric
variables or the numbers that do not have any value.
Characteristics of Nominal Scale
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• A nominal scale variable is classified into two or more
categories. In this measurement mechanism, the answer
should fall into either of the classes.
• It is qualitative. The numbers are used here to identify the
objects.
• The numbers don’t define the object characteristics. The only
permissible aspect of numbers in the nominal scale is
“counting.”
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• e.g. Gender (Male, Female)
Ordinal scale
The ordinal scale is the 2nd level of measurement that reports
the ordering and ranking of data without establishing the
degree of variation between them. Ordinal represents the
“order.” Ordinal data is known as qualitative data or
categorical data. It can be grouped, named and also ranked.
Characteristics of the Ordinal Scale
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• The ordinal scale shows the relative ranking of the variables
• It identifies and describes the magnitude of a variable
• Along with the information provided by the nominal scale,
ordinal scales give the rankings of those variables
Example:
1. Ranking of school students – 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc.
2. Ratings in restaurants
3. Assessing the degree of agreement
Totally agree
Agree
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Neutral
Disagree
Totally disagree
Interval Scale
•An interval scale is one where there is order
and the difference between two values is
meaningful.
Examples of interval variables include:
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temperature (Farenheit), temperature
(Celcius), pH, SAT score (200-800), credit
score (300-850).
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Ratio Scale
•A ratio variable, has all the properties of an
interval variable, and also has a clear
definition of 0.0. When the variable equals
0.0, there is none of that variable.
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Examples of ratio variables include:
pulse, weight, length,
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BRANCHES OF STATISTICS
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DESCRIPTIVE STATISTICS
Descriptive statistics is the term given to the
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analysis of data that helps describe, show or
summarize data in a meaningful way such
that patterns might emerge from the data.
Does not allow us to make conclusions
beyond the data we have analyzed or reach
conclusions regarding any hypotheses we
might have made.
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Simply a way to describe the data.
INFERENTIAL STATISTICS
Inferential statistics is concerned with
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making predictions or inferences about a
population from observations and analysis of
a sample.
We can take the results of an analysis using a
sample and can generalize it to the larger
population that the sample represents.
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TYPES OF ANALYSIS
Three types of analysis
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• Univariate analysis – the examination of the
distribution of cases on only one variable at a time
(e.g., height of BS Chemistry students)
• Bivariate analysis – the examination of two
variables simultaneously (e.g., the relation between
gender and weight of college students )
• Multivariate analysis – the examination of more
than two variables simultaneously (e.g., the
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relationship between gender, race and weight of
college students)
