Psychology 2080A/B Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Statistical Inference, Percentile, Descriptive Statistics

• School: Western University
• Department: Psychology
• Course: Psychology 2080A/B
• Professor: Donald Saklofske

Document Summary

Why we need statistics: descriptive statistics help us with describing what has occurred, summarizes a large amount of information, can allow for evaluation and comparison of observations. Inferential statistics allow us to speculate about what cannot be directly observed or measured: exploratory data analysis, confirmatory data analysis, moving from a small sample to a larger population. Statistical analysis helps us separate these 2 types of influence on behaviour: every test result is a product of both random influences and systematic influences, random influences include ex. Fluctuations in brain chemistry, unpredictable distractions: o =t+ e. Impossible to control all types of influences: o =observed score -your actual measurement, e(cid:454). Aski(cid:374)g (cid:455)ou to (cid:396)u(cid:374) up a(cid:374) do(cid:449)(cid:374) stai(cid:396)s, (cid:271)ut the teste(cid:396) does(cid:374)"t k(cid:374)o(cid:449) (cid:455)ou ha(cid:448)e a really bad cold (this is affecting your score: ex. Scales of measurement -properties of scales: magnitude: a measurement of "moreness" of a given quality, ex.