Statistics in Plain English

Statistics in Plain English is a straightforward, conversational introduction to statistics that

delivers exactly what its title promises. Each chapter begins with a brief overview of a stat-
istic (or set of statistics) that describes what the statistic does and when to use it, followed by
a detailed step-by-step explanation of how the statistic works and exactly what information
it provides. Chapters also include an example of the statistic (or statistics) used in real-world
research, “Worked Examples,” “Writing It Up” sections that demonstrate how to write about
each statistic, “Wrapping Up and Looking Forward” sections, and practice work problems.

Thoroughly updated throughout, this edition features several key additions and changes.
First, a new chapter on person-centered analyses, including cluster analysis and latent class
analysis (LCA) has been added, providing an important alternative to the more commonly
used variable-centered analyses (e.g., t tests, ANOVA, regression). Next, the chapter on non-
parametric statistics has been enhanced with in-depth descriptions of Mann-Whitney U,
Kruskal-Wallis, and Wilcoxon Signed-Rank analyses, in addition to the detailed discussion
of the Chi-square statistic found in the previous edition. These nonparametric statistics are
widely used when dealing with nonnormally distributed data. This edition also includes more
information about the assumptions of various statistics, including a detailed explanation
of the assumptions and consequences of violating the assumptions of regression, as well as
more coverage of the normal distribution in statistics. Finally, the book features a multitude
of real-world examples throughout to aid student understanding and provides them with a
solid understanding of how several statistics techniques commonly used by researchers in the
social sciences work.

Statistics in Plain English is suitable for a wide range of readers, including students taking
their first statistics course, professionals who want to refresh their statistical memory, and
undergraduate or graduate students who need a concise companion to a more complicated
text used in their class. The text works as a standalone or as a supplement and covers a
range of statistical concepts from descriptive statistics to factor analysis and person-centered
analyses.

Timothy C. Urdan is a Professor at Santa Clara University. He received his Ph.D. from
the Combined Program in Education and Psychology at the University of Michigan, his
Master’s degree in Education from Harvard University, and his B.A. in Psychology from the
University of California, Berkeley. He conducts research on student motivation, classroom
contexts, and teacher identity. He serves on the editorial boards of several journals and is the
coeditor of the Advances in Motivation and Achievement book series. He is a fellow of the
American Psychological Association and lives in Berkeley, California.
Statistics in Plain English
Fifth Edition

Timothy C. Urdan
 Cover image: © Timothy C. Urdan
Fifth edition published 2022
by Routledge
52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017
and by Routledge
4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2022 Taylor & Francis
The right of Timothy C. Urdan to be identified as author of this work has
been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright,
Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or
utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now
known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any
information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the
publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or
registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation
without intent to infringe.
First edition published by Lawrence Erlbaum Association, Publishers 2001
Fourth edition published by Routledge 2016
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A catalog record has been requested for this book
ISBN: 978-0-367-34282-1 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-0-367-34283-8 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-003-00645-9 (ebk)
ISBN: 978-1-032-22944-7 (ebk+)
DOI: 10.4324/9781003006459
Access the Companion Website: www.routledge.com/cw/urdan

BK-TandF-URDAN_9780367342821-211524-FM.indd 4 01/02/22 10:10 PM

Contents
Preface ix
Acknowledgments xiii
About the Author xv
Quick Guide to Statistics, Formulas, and Degrees of Freedom xvii

Chapter 1 Introduction to Social Science Research Principles and Terminology 1

The Importance of Statistics and Research in Our Lives 1
Terminology Used in Statistics and Research Methods 2
Making Sense of Distributions and Graphs 9
Wrapping Up and Looking Forward 14

Chapter 2 Measures of Central Tendency 15

Measures of Central Tendency in Depth 16
Example: The Mean, Median, and Mode of Skewed Distributions 17
Writing It Up 21
Wrapping Up and Looking Forward 22

Chapter 3 Measures of Variability 23

Range 23
Variance 24
Standard Deviation 24
Measures of Variability in Depth 25
Examples: Examining the Range, Variance, and Standard Deviation 29
Worked Examples 33
Wrapping Up and Looking Forward 34

Chapter 4 The Normal Distribution 35

Characteristics of the Normal Distribution 35
Why Is the Normal Distribution So Important? 36
The Normal Distribution in Depth 37
The Relationship between the Sampling Method and the Normal Distribution 38
Skew and Kurtosis 39
Example 1: Applying Normal Distribution Probabilities
to a Normal Distribution 40
Example 2: Applying Normal Distribution Probabilities to a Nonnormal
Distribution 42
Wrapping Up and Looking Forward 43

Chapter 5 Standardization and z Scores 45

Standardization and z Scores in Depth 45
Interpreting z Scores 46
Examples: Comparing Raw Scores and z Scores 54
Worked Examples 56
Wrapping Up and Looking Forward 57

Chapter 6 Standard Errors 59

What Is a Standard Error? 59
v
vi  ■   Contents

Standard Errors in Depth 60

How to Calculate the Standard Error of the Mean 62
The Central Limit Theorem 63
The Normal Distribution and t Distributions: Comparing z Scores
and t Values 64
The Use of Standard Errors in Inferential Statistics 67
Example: Sample Size and Standard Deviation Effects on the Standard
Error of the Mean 69
Worked Examples 71
Wrapping Up and Looking Forward 74

Chapter 7 Statistical Significance, Effect Size, and Confidence Intervals 75

Statistical Significance in Depth 76
Assumptions of Parametric Tests 82
Limitations of Statistical Significance Testing 83
Effect Size in Depth 85
Confidence Intervals in Depth 87
Example: Statistical Significance, Confidence Interval, and Effect Size
for a One-Sample t Test of Motivation 91
Wrapping Up and Looking Forward 96

Chapter 8 t Tests 97
What Is a t Test? 97
t Distributions 97
The One-Sample t Test 97
The Independent Samples t Test 98
Dependent (Paired) Samples t Test 98
Independent Samples t Tests in Depth 100
Paired or Dependent Samples t Tests in Depth 105
Example 1: Comparing Boys’ and Girls’ Grade Point Averages 108
Example 2: Comparing Fifth- and Sixth-Grade GPAs 110
Writing It Up 111
Worked Examples 112
Wrapping Up and Looking Forward 116

Chapter 9 One-Way Analysis of Variance 119

ANOVA vs. Independent t Tests 120
One-Way ANOVA in Depth 120
Post-Hoc Tests 125
Effect Size 126
Example: Comparing the Sleep of 5-, 8-, and 12-Year-Olds 129
Writing It Up 133
Worked Example 133
Wrapping Up and Looking Forward 136

Chapter 10 Factorial Analysis of Variance 139

When to Use Factorial ANOVA 139
Some Cautions 141
Factorial ANOVA in Depth 141
Analysis of Covariance 147
Illustration of Factorial ANOVA, ANCOVA, and Effect Size with Real Data 148
 Contents  ■   vii

Example: Performance, Choice, and Public vs. Private Evaluation 151

Writing It Up 152
Wrapping Up and Looking Forward 153

Chapter 11 Repeated-Measures Analysis of Variance 155

When to Use Each Type of Repeated-Measures Technique 155
Repeated-Measures ANOVA in Depth 158
Repeated-Measures Analysis of Covariance (ANCOVA) 161
Adding an Independent Group Variable 163
Example: Changing Attitudes about Standardized Tests 165
Writing It Up 169
Wrapping Up and Looking Forward 170

Chapter 12 Correlation 171

When to Use Correlation and What It Tells Us 171
Pearson Correlation Coefficients in Depth 174
Comparing Correlation Coefficients and Calculating Confidence Intervals:
The Fisher’s Z Transformation 184
A Brief Word on Other Types of Correlation Coefficients 186
Example: The Correlation Between Grades and Test Scores 187
Worked Example: Statistical Significance of a Sample Correlation
Coefficient 188
Writing It Up 189
Wrapping Up and Looking Forward 190

Chapter 13 Regression 191

Simple vs. Multiple Regression 191
Regression in Depth 192
Multiple Regression 201
Example: Predicting the Use of Self-Handicapping Strategies 209
Writing It Up 211
Worked Examples 211
Wrapping Up and Looking Forward 214

Chapter 14 Nonparametric Statistics 215

Mann-Whitney U 215
Mann-Whitney U Test in Depth 216
Wilcoxon Signed-Rank Test 218
Wilcoxon Signed-Rank Test in Depth 219
Kruskal-Wallis Test 221
Chi-square (χ2) Test of Independence 222
Chi-Square Test of Independence in Depth 223
Example: Generational Status and Grade Level 226
Writing It Up 228
Worked Example 228
Wrapping Up and Looking Forward 230

Chapter 15 Factor Analysis and Reliability Analysis: Data Reduction Techniques 231
Factor Analysis in Depth 232
A More Concrete Example of Exploratory Factor Analysis 235
Confirmatory Factor Analysis: A Brief Introduction 239
viii  ■   Contents

Reliability Analysis in Depth 241

Writing It Up 243
Wrapping Up and Looking Forward 244

Chapter 16 Person-Centered Analysis 245

Cluster Analysis 246
Cluster Analysis in Depth 247
Latent Class Analysis 253
Latent Class Analysis in Depth 254
Writing It Up 256
Wrapping Up and Looking Forward 257

Appendix A: Area under the Normal Curve beyond Z 259

Appendix B: Critical Values of the t Distributions 261
Appendix C: Critical Values of the F Distributions 263
Appendix D: Critical Values of the Studentized Range Statistic (for Tukey HSD Tests) 269
Appendix E: Table of the Fischer’s Z Transformations for Correlation Coefficients 273
Appendix F: Critical Values of the Mann-Whitney U Statistic 275
Appendix G: Critical Values for Wilcoxon Signed-Rank Test 277
Appendix H: Critical Values of the X2 Distributions 279

Bibliography 281
Glossary of Symbols 283
Glossary of Terms 285
Index 297
Preface
Why Use Statistics?
The first edition of this book was published in 2001. As I complete this fifth edition 20 years
later, I am awed by how much the world has changed. There was no Facebook, Instagram,
or Twitter back then, and the Internet was still in its early stages of what would become a
world-altering technology. What the Internet, and social media platforms in particular, has
ushered in is an era where everybody, regardless of their level of expertise, can voice their
opinion and it can be heard. Back in 2001, I was frustrated by how often people believed
things that were not supported by evidence simply because their own experience did not fit
the evidence. Now that everyone has a platform to voice their viewpoint, and it is easy to
find hundreds or thousands of other people who share the same view, even when there is no
evidence to support it, can you imagine how frustrated I am?
Although the opinions, personal stories, and conspiracy theories that are rampant on
the Internet can be compelling, as researchers we must go beyond the personal story or
impassioned argument and look for broader evidence. How can we tell whether vaccines
cause autism? How do we decide whether public schools are failing, whether teacher unions
help or hinder valuable reform, and whether charter schools do a better job of educating
students? To answer these questions, we need good data, and then we need to analyze the
data using the appropriate statistics.
Many people have a general distrust of statistics, believing that crafty statisticians can
“make statistics say whatever they want” or “lie with statistics.” In fact, if a researcher
calculates the statistics correctly, he or she cannot make them say anything other than what
they say, and statistics never lie. Rather, crafty researchers can interpret what the statistics
mean in a variety of ways, and those who do not understand statistics are forced to either
accept the interpretations that statisticians and researchers offer or reject statistics com-
pletely. I believe a better option is to gain an understanding of how statistics work and then
use that understanding to interpret the statistics one sees and hears for oneself. The purpose
of this book is to make it a little easier to understand statistics.

Uses of Statistics
One of the potential shortfalls of anecdotal data is that they are idiosyncratic. One of
our cognitive shortcomings, as people, is that we tend to believe that if something is true
for us, it is just a fact. “I eat a multivitamin every day and I haven’t been sick for 20 years!”
“My grandmother smoked a pack a day for 50 years and she lived until she was 96!” “My par-
ents spanked me and I turned out fine!” Although these statements may (or may not!) be true
for the individuals who uttered them, that does not mean they are true for everyone, or even for
most people. Statistics allow researchers to collect information, or data, from a large number
of people (or other kinds of samples) and then summarize their typical experience. Do most
people who take multivitamins live healthier lives? Do most people who smoke a pack a day
live longer or shorter than people who do not smoke? Is there any association between whether
one is spanked and how one “turns out,” however that is defined? Statistics allow researchers
to take a large batch of data and summarize it into a couple of numbers, such as an average. Of
course, when data are summarized into a single number, a lot of information is lost, including
the fact that different people have very different experiences. So, it is important to remember
that, for the most part, statistics do not provide useful information about each individual’s
experience. Rather, researchers generally use statistics to make general statements about a sample
ix
x  ■   Preface

or a population. Although personal stories are often moving or interesting, it is also important
to understand what the typical or average experience is. For this, we need statistics.
Statistics are also used to reach conclusions about general differences between groups.
For example, suppose that in my family, there are four children, two men and two women.
Suppose that the women in my family are taller than the men. This personal experience may
lead me to the conclusion that women are generally taller than men. Of course, we know
that, on average, men are taller than women. The reason we know this is because researchers
have taken large, random samples of men and women and compared their average heights.
Researchers are often interested in making such comparisons: Do cancer patients survive
longer using one drug than another? Is one method of teaching children to read more
effective than another? Do men and women differ in their enjoyment of a certain movie? To
answer these questions, we need to collect data from samples and compare these data using
statistics. The results we get from such comparisons are often more trustworthy than the
simple observations people make from nonrandom samples, such as the different heights of
men and women in my family.
Statistics can also be used to see if scores on two variables are related and to make
predictions. For example, statistics can be used to see whether smoking cigarettes is related
to the likelihood of developing lung cancer. For years, tobacco companies argued that there
was no relationship between smoking and cancer. Sure, some people who smoked developed
cancer. However, the tobacco companies argued that (a) many people who smoke never
develop cancer, and (b) many people who smoke tend to do other things that may lead to
cancer development, such as eating unhealthy foods and not exercising. With the help of
statistics in a number of studies, researchers were finally able to produce a preponderance
of evidence indicating that, in fact, there is a relationship between cigarette smoking and
cancer. Because statistics tend to focus on overall patterns rather than individual cases, this
research did not suggest that everyone who smokes will develop cancer. Rather, the research
demonstrated that, on average, people have a greater chance of developing cancer if they
smoke cigarettes than if they do not.
With a moment’s thought, you can imagine a large number of interesting and important
questions that statistics about relationships can help you answer. Is there a relationship
between self-esteem and academic achievement? Is there a relationship between the appear-
ance of criminal defendants and their likelihood of being convicted? Is it possible to predict
the violent crime rate of a state from the amount of money the state spends on drug treat-
ment programs? If we know the father’s height, how accurately can we predict the heights of
their sons? These and thousands of other questions have been examined by researchers using
statistics designed to determine the relationship between variables in a population. With
the rise of the Internet, data is being collected constantly. For example, most casual users of
the Internet and social media provide information about their age, gender, where they live,
how much money they make, how much they spend, what they like to buy, who their friends
are, which web sites they visit, what they like, whether they are married or single, etc. With
the help of statistics, data analysts determine what advertisements you should see when you
visit a website, how to attract you to certain websites, and how to get you to encourage your
friends (without your knowledge) to like or buy various products. More than ever before,
statistics and data are deeply affecting many parts of your life. With this in mind, wouldn’t it
be nice to understand a bit more about how these statistics work?

How to Use This Book

If you are new to statistics, this book can provide an easy introduction to many of the basic,
and most commonly used, statistics. Or, if you have already taken a course or two in statistics,
this book may be useful as a reference book to refresh your memory about statistical concepts
 Preface  ■   xi

you have encountered in the past. It is important to remember that this book is much less
detailed than a traditional statistics textbook. This book was designed to provide a relatively
short and inexpensive introduction to statistics, with a greater focus on the conceptual part of
statistics than the computational, mathematical part. Most of the concepts discussed in this
book are more complex than the presentation in this book would suggest, and a thorough
understanding of these concepts may be acquired only with the use of a more traditional,
more detailed textbook.
With that warning firmly in mind, let me describe the potential benefits of this book,
and how to make the most of them. As a researcher and a teacher of statistics, I have found
that statistics textbooks often contain a lot of technical information that can be intimidating
to nonstatisticians. Although, as I said previously, this information is important, some-
times it is useful to have a short, simple description of a statistic, when it should be used,
and how to make sense of it. This is particularly true for students taking only their first or
second statistics course, those who do not consider themselves to be “mathematically
inclined,” and those who may have taken statistics years ago and now find themselves in need
of a little refresher. My purpose in writing this book is to provide short, simple descriptions
and explanations of a number of statistics that are easy to read and understand.
To help you use this book in a manner that best suits your needs, I have organized each
chapter into sections. In the first section, a brief (one to two pages) description of the statistic
is given, including what the statistic is used for and what information it provides. The second
section of each chapter contains a slightly longer (3–12 pages) discussion of the statistic. In
this section, I provide a bit more information about how the statistic works, an explanation
of how the formula for calculating the statistic works, the strengths and weaknesses of the
statistic, and the conditions that must exist to use the statistic. Each chapter includes an
example or two in which the statistic is calculated and interpreted. The chapters conclude
with illustrations of how to write up the statistical information for publication and a set of
work problems.
Before reading the book, it may be helpful to note three of its features. First, some of the
chapters discuss more than one statistic. For example, in Chapter 2, three measures of central
tendency are described: the mean, median, and mode. Second, some of the chapters cover
statistical concepts rather than specific statistical techniques. For example, in Chapter 4,
the normal distribution is discussed. There is also a chapter on statistical significance, effect
size, and confidence intervals. Finally, you should remember that the chapters in this book
are not necessarily designed to be read in order. The book is organized such that the more
basic statistics and statistical concepts are in the earlier chapters whereas the more complex
concepts appear later in the book. However, it is not necessary to read one chapter before
understanding the next. Rather, each chapter in the book was written to stand on its own.
This was done so that you could use each chapter as needed. If, for example, you had no
problem understanding t tests when you learned about them in your statistics class but find
yourself struggling to understand one-way analysis of variance, you may want to skip the
t test chapter (Chapter 8) and skip directly to the analysis of variance chapter (Chapter 9).
If you are brand new to statistics, however, keep in mind that some statistical concepts (e.g.,
t tests, ANOVA) are easier to understand if you first learn about the mean, variance, and
hypothesis testing.

New Features in This Edition

This fifth edition of Statistics in Plain English includes a number of features not available
in the previous editions. I added a new chapter that focuses on person-centered analysis
like cluster analysis and latent class analysis (see Chapter 16) to the book. In addition, the
chapter on nonparametric statistics (see Chapter 14) now has much more information about
xii  ■   Preface

the Mann-Whitney U test, the Wilcoxon signed-rank test, and the Kruskal-Wallis test. I’ve
added more information about probability to Chapter 4 and Chapter 7, a concept that can be
confusing to students who are new to statistics (as well as some statistics veterans). In addition,
I’ve added a section about assumptions of parametric statistics to Chapter 7 and more informa-
tion in several other chapters about the assumptions for each statistic, and some of the conse-
quences of violating those assumptions. Chapter 1 now begins with a longer explanation of the
importance of statistics in our everyday lives, and each of the last nine chapters in the book
includes an example from the real-world research that employs the statistic, or statistics,
covered in each chapter. Each of the 16 chapters now includes a set of work problems with
solutions provided on the website that accompanies this book.
These additions to the new edition were not at the expense of useful features that were
added in previous editions of the book. These include a section called “Worked Examples”
that appear in most of the chapters in the book. In this section, I work through all of the steps
to calculate and interpret the statistic featured in the chapter, either by hand or using SPSS.
There are also links to videos of me calculating each statistic or conducting analyses on SPSS
or R and interpreting the output on the website that accompanies the book. Throughout the
book, there is a greater emphasis on, and description of effect size. The support materials
provided on the website have also been updated, including many new and improved videos
showing how to calculate statistics, how to read and interpret the appendices, and how to
understand output produced by SPSS (and in R for some of the statistics). PowerPoint and
text summaries of each chapter, work problems with solutions, and a set of test questions are
also provided on the website.
Acknowledgments
I would like to sincerely thank the reviewers who provided their time and expertise reading
previous drafts of this book and offered very helpful feedback. I could not fit all of your
suggestions into this new edition, but I incorporated many of them and the book is better
as a result of your hard work. Thanks to Georgette Enriquez at Taylor & Francis for her
patience, help, and guidance. As always, students and colleagues at Santa Clara University
made valuable contributions to this book, so thank you to Stephanie Zhi, Alexa Desanctis,
and Elwood Mills. Thanks, again, to my children for their patience as I worked on this book.
Finally, thanks to you readers for using this book. We are in this statistics struggle together.

xiii
About the Author
Timothy C. Urdan is a Professor in the Department of Psychology at Santa Clara University.
He received his Ph.D. from the Combined Program in Education and Psychology at the
University of Michigan, his Master’s degree in Education from Harvard University, and his
B.A. in Psychology from U.C. Berkeley. He conducts research on student motivation, class-
room contexts, and teacher identity. He serves on the editorial boards of several journals and
is the co-editor of the Advances in Motivation and Achievement book series. He is a fellow of
the American Psychological Association and lives in Berkeley, California.

xv
Quick Guide to Statistics, Formulas,
and Degrees of Freedom
Degrees of
Statistic Symbol When you use it Formula freedom (df )

Mean X, μ To find the average of a ΣX ΣX

X = ,µ=
distribution. n N
Standard s To use sample data to Σ( X − X )2
deviation estimate the average s=
n −1
(sample) deviation in a distribution.
It is a measure of variability.
Standard σ To find the average of Σ( X − µ )2
deviation deviation in a distribution. σ=
N
(population) It is a measure of variability.
Standard score z To find the difference between X −µ
z= or
for individual an individual score and the σ
(z score) mean in standard deviation
units. X−X
z=
s
Standard score z To find difference between a X −µ
for mean sample mean and a z=
σx
(z score) population mean in standard
error units.
Standard error of s x , σ x To find the average difference σ
σx =
the mean between the population n
mean and sample means
or
when samples are of a given
size and randomly selected. s
sx =
n
1-sample t test t To determine whether the X −µ n–1
difference between a sample t =
sx
mean and the population
mean is statistically
significant.
Independent t To determine whether the X1 − X 2 n1 + n2 – 2
samples t test difference between two t =
s x1− x 2
independent sample means
is statistically significant.
Dependent t To determine whether the X −Y N–1
(paired) samples difference between two t = where N is
sD
t test dependent (i.e., paired) the number
sample means is statistically of pairs of
significant. scores.
One-way F Two determine whether the MSb K – 1, N – K
F=
ANOVA difference between two or MSe Where K is
more independent sample number of
means is statistically groups, N is
significant. number of
cases across
all samples

xvii
xviii  ■   Quick Guide to Statistics, Formulas, and Degrees of Freedom

Degrees of
Statistic Symbol When you use it Formula freedom (df )
Cohen’s d (effect d To determine the size of an X1 − X 2
size) effect (e.g., difference d=
Sˆ
between sample means) in
standard deviation units.
Confidence CI To create an interval within CI95 = X ± (t 95 )( s x )
interval for which one is 95% or 99%
sample mean certain the population
parameter (e.g., mean,
difference between means,
correlation) is contained.
Correlation r To calculate a measure of Σ( z x z y )
coefficient association between two r=
N
(Pearson) intervally scaled variables.
Coefficient of r2 To determine the percentage r2
determination of variance in one variable
that is explained by the other
variable in a correlational
analysis. It is a measure of
effect size.
t test for t To determine whether a N −2 N–2
correlation sample correlation t = (r ) where N is
1− r 2
coefficient coefficient is statistically number of
significant. cases in the
sample
Regression b To determine the amount of sy
coefficient change in the Y variable for b=r×
sx
every change of one unit in
the X variable in a regression
analysis.
Regression a To determine the predicted a = Y − bX
intercept value of Y when X equals
zero in a regression analysis.
Predicted value of Yˆ To determine the predicted Yˆ = bX + a
Y value of Y for a given value
of X in a regression analysis.
Chi square χ2 To examine whether the  (O − E )2  R – 1, C – 1
frequency of scores in χ2 = ∑  
 E 
various categories of
categorical variables are
different from what would be
expected.
Mann-Whitney U U To compare the ranks of n1 (n1 + 1)
scores in two independent U1 = R1 − or
2
samples.
n2 (n2 + 1)
U 2 = R2 −
2
Wilcoxon w To compare the medians of (
w1 = Σ neg. different ranks )
signed-rank two paired samples.
w2 = Σ ( pos. different ranks )
Kruskal-Wallis H To compare the ranks 12  R12 R 22 R 32  K–1
+ + − 3 (n + 1) Where K is
of three or more n (n + 1)  n1 n2 n3 
independent groups. the number
of groups
Chapter 1
Introduction to Social Science Research
Principles and Terminology

The Importance of Statistics and Research in Our Lives

Today, more than ever, your life is being guided by statistics because in today’s world, there
is more information, or data, about you that is being collected and used. Every time you go
onto a website on the Internet like Google, Netflix, Amazon, or a social media site, you pro-
vide information about yourself to the companies that own those sites that can be used and
sold to other companies. The San Francisco Bay Area, where I live, is home to the highest
concentration of billionaires in the world. Sadly, I am not one of them. However, owners
of many high-tech companies—Google, Facebook, Apple, Amazon—have made tens of
millions, if not billions, of dollars by collecting valuable information from users.
One of my favorite expressions, and one that I tell my own children, goes like this: “If you
are not paying for the product, you are the product.” What this means is that when you use a
free website or an app, your personal information is collected by those sites and sold to other
companies. Essentially, you are a product that companies want to buy. But what makes your
information so valuable? It just so happens that the more a company knows about you, the
better they are able to show you the products that you are most likely to buy. When you login
to Instagram and like a video of a teenage boy riding a skateboard, you are providing the
following information to the company that owns Instagram (Facebook): you are most likely
a boy between the ages of 10 and 20, you may like skateboarding yourself, and you probably
like shoes that skateboarders usually like to wear. If you like several other pictures and videos
of skateboarders, it is even more likely that you fit these characteristics. Facebook can now
sell this information about you, and everyone else who liked skateboarding photos, to skate-
board makers and shoe brands that make shoes for skateboarders (e.g., Vans), and they can
advertise their products directly to you.
The best way for companies to sell their products is to advertise them to people who
are most likely to buy them. In the old days, before the Internet, advertisers mostly relied
on media like television, radio, newspapers, and billboards for their advertising. Although
companies collected some information to help them decide where and when to advertise,
this information was not that accurate. For example, people who watch the news on televi-
sion tend to be older, so companies that serve older people often advertise their products on
news channels. You will see a lot of advertisements for drugs that older Americans use, such
as medications for heart disease or diabetes, during these shows. However, advertisers do
not know how many viewers of an evening newscast might be suffering from heart disease.
They just know that viewers tend to be old. In contrast, someone on the Internet may search
“heart disease remedies” on Google or go onto Facebook and announce their heart disease or
may like their friends’ posts involving heart disease. This kind of specific information allows

DOI: 10.4324/9781003006459-1
2  ■   Social Science Research Principles

companies to target their advertising much more precisely to those who may be most inter-
ested in using their products, and this gives companies a better return on their advertising
dollars.

The Age of Analytics

All the data that companies use to better target their advertising are analyzed statistically to
make predictions about who is most likely to respond to the advertising and purchase their
products. Using data to predict future behavior—such as purchasing a product, exercising,
or watching a movie on Netflix—is known as predictive analytics. Data and statistics have
long been used to predict future outcomes. For example, insurance companies have used data
about their customers age, gender, driving record, and health behaviors to predict things such
as their likelihood of getting into an automobile accident or dying before a certain age. These
analytics are used to determine how much money individuals pay for insurance, or if they
can even buy insurance at all. Today, with the tremendous increase in the amount of data that
people share about themselves via the Internet, predictive analytics have become much more
precise, powerful, and ubiquitous. Statistical analytics are used to recommend which videos
you should watch, which products you should buy, who you should connect with on social
media, when you should go to the doctor, and even for whom you should vote.

The Case of Cambridge Analytica

In 2014, a company named Cambridge Analytica used the data of 50 million Facebook users
to create detailed profiles about the political orientations of these users. The data of these
users included information about their age, gender, friendship network, posts on Facebook,
and likes of other users’ posts. These data were analyzed statistically and used to decide which
political ads and posts users would see on Facebook. The presidential campaign of Donald
Trump used this information to send highly targeted ads to users who were deemed, on the
basis of the data collected via Facebook, to be voters who could be persuaded to vote for
Trump. One of the interesting things about this case, besides how sophisticated the data
analysis was, was that the 50 million Facebook users were not even aware that their data were
being used for this purpose. This case provided a fascinating example of how much informa-
tion almost all of us provide about ourselves through our networks of friends and our online
activity, and how these data can be used to create analytical models that can then be used to
influence our behavior through carefully targeted advertising. For most of us, the whole pro-
cess of data collection, analytics, and behavioral manipulation occurs without our awareness
or understanding of the process.
As statistics play an increasingly prominent role in our lives, it is important to understand
the language of statistics and research. In this chapter, I introduce some of the basic ter-
minologies used in research, terms that will be used repeatedly throughout this book as we
examine several of the statistical methods that are used by social scientists.

Terminology Used in Statistics and Research Methods

When I was in graduate school, one of my statistics professors often repeated what passes,
in statistics, for a joke: “If this is all Greek to you, well that’s good.” Unfortunately, most of
the class was so lost we didn’t even get the joke. The world of statistics and research in the
social sciences, like any specialized field, has its own terminology, language, and conventions.
In this chapter, I review some of the fundamental research principles and terminologies,
including the distinction between samples and populations, methods of sampling, types of
variables, the distinction between inferential and descriptive statistics, and a brief description
about different types of research designs.
 Social Science Research Principles  ■   3

Populations, Samples, Parameters, and Statistics

A population is an individual or a group that represents all the members of a certain group or
a category of interest. A sample is a subset drawn from the larger population (see Figure 1.1).
For example, suppose that I wanted to know the average income of the current full-time
employees at Google. There are two ways that I could find this average. First, I could get a list
of every full-time employee at Google and find out the annual income of each member on
this list. Because this list contains every member of the group that I am interested in, it can
be considered a population. If I were to collect these data and calculate the mean, I would
have generated a parameter, because a parameter is a value generated from, or applied to, a
population. Another way to generate the mean income of the full-time employees at Google
would be to randomly select a subset of employee names from my list and calculate the
average income of this subset. The subset is known as a sample (in this case, it is a random
sample), and the mean that I generate from this sample is a type of statistic. Statistics are
values derived from sample data, whereas parameters are values that are either derived from,
or applied to, population data.
It is important to keep a couple of things in mind about samples and populations. First,
a population does not need to be large to count as a population. For example, if I wanted
to know the average height of the students in my statistics class this term, then all of the
members of the class (collectively) would comprise the population. If my class only has five
students, then my population only has five cases. Second, populations (and samples) do not
necessarily include people. For example, I can calculate the average age of the dogs that
visited a veterinary clinic in the last year. The population in this study is made up of dogs,
not people. Similarly, I may want to know the total amount of carbon monoxide produced by
Ford vehicles that were assembled in the U.S. during 2005. In this example, my population is
cars, but not all cars—it is limited to Ford cars, and only those actually assembled in a single
country during a single calendar year.
Third, the researcher generally defines the population, either explicitly or implicitly. In
the examples above, I defined my populations (of dogs and cars) explicitly. Often, however,
researchers define their populations less clearly. For example, a researcher may conduct a study
with the aim of examining the frequency of depression among adolescents. The researcher’s
sample, however, may include only a group of 15-year-olds who visited a mental health
service provider in Connecticut in a given year. This presents a potential problem and leads
directly into the fourth and final little thing to keep in mind about samples and populations:

FIGURE 1.1 A population and a sample drawn from the population.

4  ■   Social Science Research Principles

Samples are not necessarily good representations of the populations from which they were
selected. In the example about the rates of depression among adolescents, notice that there
are two potential populations. First, there is the population identified by the researcher and
implied in the research question: all adolescents. However, notice that the population of
adolescents is a very large group, including all human beings, in all countries, between the
ages of, say, 13 and 20. Second, there is the much more specific population that was defined
by the sample that was selected: 15-year-olds who visited a mental health service provider in
Connecticut during a given year. In Figure 1.1, I offer a graphic that illustrates the concept
of a sample of 3 individuals being selected from a population of 10 individuals.

Inferential and Descriptive Statistics

Why is it important to determine which of these two populations is of interest in this study?
Because the consumer of this research must be able to determine how well the results from
the sample generalize to the larger population. Clearly, depression rates among 15-year-olds
who visit mental health service providers in Connecticut may be different from other ado-
lescents. For example, adolescents who visit mental health service providers may, on average,
be more depressed than those who do not seek the services of a psychologist. Similarly, ado-
lescents in Connecticut may be more depressed, as a group, than adolescents in California,
where the sun shines and Mickey Mouse keeps everyone smiling. Perhaps 15-year-olds, who
have to suffer the indignities of beginning high school without yet being able to legally drive,
are more depressed than their 16-year-old, driving peers. In short, there are many reasons to
suspect that the adolescents who were not included in the study may differ in their depres-
sion rates from adolescents who were included in the study. When such differences exist, it
is difficult to apply the results garnered from a sample to the larger population. In research
terminology, the results may not generalize from the sample to the population, particularly
if the population is not clearly defined.
So why is generalizability important? To answer this question, I need to explain the dis-
tinction between descriptive and inferential statistics. Descriptive statistics apply only
to the members of a sample or population from which data have been collected. In con-
trast, inferential statistics refer to the use of sample data to reach some conclusions (i.e.,
make some inferences) about the characteristics of the larger population that the sample is
supposed to represent. Although researchers are sometimes interested in simply describing
the characteristics of a sample, for the most part, we are much more concerned with what our
sample tells us about the population from which the sample was drawn. In the depression
study, the researcher does not care so much about the depression levels of the sample per se.
Rather, the data from the sample are used to reach some conclusions about the depression
levels of adolescents in general. However, to make the leap from sample data to inferences
about a population, one must be very clear about whether the sample accurately represents
the population. If the sample accurately represents the population, then observations in the
sample data should hold true for the population. But if the sample is not truly representative
of the population, we cannot be confident that conclusions based on our sample data will
apply to the larger population. An important first step in this process is to clearly define the
population that the sample is alleged to represent.

Sampling Issues
There are several ways researchers can select samples. One of the most useful, but also the
most difficult, is random sampling. In statistics, the term random has a much more spe-
cific meaning than the common usage of the term. It does not mean haphazard. In statis-
tical jargon, random means that every member of a defined population has an equal chance
of being selected into a sample. The major benefit of random sampling is that any differ-
ences between the sample and the population from which the sample was selected will not
 Social Science Research Principles  ■   5

be systematic. Notice that in the depression study example, the sample differed from the
population in important, systematic (i.e., nonrandom) ways. For example, the researcher most
likely systematically selected adolescents who were more likely to be depressed than the
average adolescent because she selected those who had visited mental health service provid-
ers. Although randomly selected samples may differ from the larger population in important
ways (especially if the sample is small), these differences are due to chance rather than to a
systematic bias in the selection process.
Representative sampling is another way of selecting cases for a study. With this method, the
researcher purposely selects cases so that they will match the larger population on specific char-
acteristics. For example, if I want to conduct a study examining the average annual income of
adults in San Francisco, by definition my population is “adults in San Francisco.” This population
includes a number of subgroups (e.g., different ethnic and racial groups, men and women, retired
adults, disabled adults, parents, single adults, etc.). These different subgroups may be expected to
have different incomes. To get an accurate picture of the incomes of the adult population in San
Francisco, I may want to select a sample that represents the population well. Therefore, I would
try to match the percentages of each group in my sample with those in my population. For
example, if 15 percent of the adult population in San Francisco is retired, I would select my
sample in a manner that included 15 percent retired adults. Similarly, if 55 percent of the adult
population in San Francisco is male, 55 percent of my sample should be male. With random
sampling, I may get a sample that looks like my population or I may not. But with representa-
tive sampling, I can ensure that my sample looks similar to my population on some important
variables. This type of sampling procedure can be costly and time-consuming, but it increases my
chances of being able to generalize the results from my sample to the population.
Another common method of selecting samples is called convenience sampling. In con-
venience sampling, the researcher generally selects participants on the basis of proximity,
ease of access, and willingness to participate (i.e., convenience). For example, if I want to
do a study on the achievement levels of eighth-grade students, I may select a sample of
200 students from the nearest middle school to my office. I might ask the parents of 300 of
the eighth-grade students in the school to participate, receive permission from the parents
of 220 of the students, and then collect data from the 200 students that show up at school on
the day I hand out my survey. This is a convenience sample. Although this method of select-
ing a sample is clearly less labor-intensive than selecting a random or representative sample,
that does not necessarily make it a bad way to select a sample. If my convenience sample does
not differ from my population of interest in ways that influence the outcome of the study, then
it is a perfectly acceptable method of selecting a sample.
To illustrate the importance of a sampling method in research, I offer two examples
of problematic sampling methods that have led to faulty conclusions. First, a report by
the American Chemical Society (2002) noted that several beach closures in southern
California were caused by faulty sampling methods. To test for pollution levels in the
ocean, researchers often take a single sample of water and test it. If the pollution levels are
too high in the sample, the beach is declared unsafe and is closed. However, water condi-
tions change very quickly, and a single sample may not accurately represent the overall pol-
lution levels of water at the beach. More samples, taken at different times during the day
and from different areas along the beach, would have produced results that more accurately
represented the true pollution levels of the larger area of the beach, and there would have
been fewer beach closures.
The second example involves the diagnosis of heart disease in women. For decades, doc-
tors and medical researchers considered heart disease to be a problem only for men. As a
result, the largest and most influential studies included only male samples (Doshi, 2015).
Two consequences of this failure to include women in the samples that were researched were
that doctors were less likely to order testing for heart disease for their female patients than
6  ■   Social Science Research Principles

their male patients, and the symptoms of heart disease and cardiac failure among women,
which are often different from those of men, were not understood. Many women who could
have had their heart disease treated early or their symptoms of a cardiac arrest quickly diag-
nosed died because women were not included in the samples for research on heart disease
and heart attacks. The population of people with heart disease clearly includes women, so the
samples that included only men were not representative of the population.

Types of Variables and Scales of Measurement

In social science research, a number of terms are used to describe different types of variables.
A variable is pretty much anything that can be codified and has more than a single value
(e.g., income, gender, age, height, attitudes about school, score on a measure of depression,
etc.). A constant, in contrast, has only a single score. For example, if every member of a
sample is male, the “gender” category is a constant. Types of variables include quantitative
(or continuous) and qualitative (or categorical). A quantitative variable is one that is scored
in such a way that the numbers, or values, indicate some sort of amount. For example, height
is a quantitative (or continuous) variable because higher scores on this variable indicate a
greater amount of height. In contrast, qualitative variables are those for which the assigned
values do not indicate more or less of a certain quality. If I conduct a study to compare the
eating habits of people from Maine, New Mexico, and Wyoming, my “state” variable has
three values (e.g., 1 = Maine, 2 = New Mexico, 3 = Wyoming). Notice that a value of 3 on
this variable is not more than a value of 1 or 2—it is simply different. The labels represent
qualitative differences in location, not quantitative differences. A commonly used qualitative
variable in social science research is the dichotomous variable. This is a variable that has two
different categories (e.g., child or adult, left-handed or right-handed).
In social science research, there are four different scales of measurement for variables:
nominal, ordinal, interval, and ratio. A nominally scaled variable has different categories
(e.g., male and female, Experimental Group 1, Experimental Group 2, Control Group, etc.).
Ordinal variables are those whose values are placed in a meaningful order, but the distances
between the values are not equal. For example, if I wanted to know the 10 richest people in
America, in order from the wealthiest to the 10th richest, the wealthiest American would
receive a score of 1, the next richest a score of 2, and so on through 10. Notice that while
this scoring system tells me where each of the wealthiest 10 Americans stands in relation
to the others (e.g., Bill Gates is 1, Michael Bloomberg is 8, etc.), it does not tell me how
much distance there is between each score. So while I know that the wealthiest American
is richer than the second wealthiest, I do not know if he has one dollar more or one billion
dollars more. Variables measured with an interval scale have values that have order, but
they also have equal distances between each unit on the scale. For example, businesses often
survey their customers to gain information about how satisfied they are with the service they
received. They may be asked to rate the service on a scale from 1 to 10, and this kind of rat-
ing scale is an interval scale of measurement. On such surveys, the distance between each
number is presumed to be equal, such that a score of 10 would indicate twice as much sat-
isfaction than a score of 5.1 Variables measured using a ratio scale of measurement have the
same properties as intervally scaled variables, but they have one additional property: Ratio
scales can have a value of zero, while interval scales do not. A great deal of social science
research employs measures with no zero value, such as attitude and beliefs surveys (e.g., “On
a scale from 1 to 5, how much do you like orange soda?”). Examples of ratio scaled variables
include temperatures (e.g., Celsius, Fahrenheit), income measured in dollars, measures of

1 There has been quite a bit of debate about whether it is accurate to treat these kinds of attitudinal scales as ratio variables. It is not
clear whether people really think of the intervals between the numbers as being equal in size. Nonetheless, researchers typically
treat these kinds of attitudinal measures as intervally scaled when calculating statistics that require variables using either interval
or ratio scales.
 Social Science Research Principles  ■   7

FIGURE 1.2 Difference between ordinal and interval/ratio scales of measurement.

weight and distance, and many others. Figure 1.2 illustrates a critical difference between
ordinal and interval or ratio scales of measurement: Ordinal scales don’t provide information
about the distance between the units of measurement, but interval and ratio scales do.
One useful way to think about these different kinds of variables is in terms of how much
information they provide. While nominal variables only provide labels for the different cat-
egories of the variable, ordinal variables offer a bit more information by telling us the order of
the values. Variables measured using interval scales provide even more information, telling us
both the order of the values and the distance between the values. Finally, variables measured
with ratio scales add just a little bit more information by including the value of zero in its
range of possible values. Figure 1.3 provides a graphic to help you think about the informa-
tion provided by each of these four types of variables.

FIGURE 1.3 Hierarchical arrangement of scales of measurement.

8  ■   Social Science Research Principles

Research Designs
There are a variety of research methods and designs employed by social scientists. Sometimes
researchers use an experimental design. In this type of research, the experimenter divides
the sample into different groups and then compares the groups on one or more variables of
interest. For example, I may want to know whether my newly developed mathematics curric-
ulum is better than the old one. I select a sample of 40 students and, using random assign-
ment, teach 20 students a lesson using the old curriculum and the other 20 using the new
curriculum. Then I test each group to see which group learned more mathematical concepts
and find that, on average, students taught with the new curriculum had higher test scores
than did students taught with the old math curriculum. This method of random assignment
to groups and testing the effects of a particular treatment is known as a randomized control
trial (RCT) experiment. It has been used for years in medical and laboratory research in the
physical and social sciences, and in recent years has been used to great effect in the social sci-
ences outside of laboratory settings. For example, Walton and Cohen (2011) used an RCT
design to examine whether a brief intervention could increase first-year college students’
feeling of belonging and decrease their feelings of isolation at a university. They randomly
assigned about half of their participants to receive their intervention while the other half did
not, then they compared the two groups and found that those who received the intervention
had better psychological and academic outcomes. By assigning students to the two groups
using random assignment, it is hoped that any important differences between the two groups
will be distributed evenly between the two groups and that any differences in outcomes
between the two groups are due to the experimental treatment that was given to one group
but not the other. Of course, this may not be true.
A quasi-experimental research design is quite similar to an experimental design. Both of
these designs typically involve manipulating a variable to see if that variable has an effect on
an outcome. In addition, both research designs include some sort of random assignment. The
major difference is that in a quasi-experimental design, the research usually occurs outside
the lab, in a naturally occurring setting. In the earlier example used to illustrate the experi-
mental design, I could have had the students come to my research lab and conducted my
study in a controlled setting so that I could tightly control all of the conditions and make
them identical between the two groups, except for the math curriculum that I used. In a
quasi-experimental study, I might find two existing classrooms with 20 students each and
ask the teacher in one classroom to use the old math curriculum and the teacher in another
classroom to use the new curriculum. Instead of randomly assigning students to these two
classrooms (which is difficult to do in a real school), I might randomly select which class-
room gets the new curriculum and which one uses the old. I could take steps to try to min-
imize the differences between the two classrooms (e.g., conduct the study in two different
classes of students that are taught by the same teacher, try to find two classrooms that are
similar in terms of the gender composition of the students, etc.), but generally speaking it is
more difficult to control the conditions in a quasi-experimental design than an experimental
design. The benefit of a quasi-experimental design, however, is that it allows the researcher
to test the effects of experimental manipulations in more natural, real-world conditions than
those found in a research laboratory.
Correlational research designs are also a common method of conducting research in
the social sciences. In this type of research, participants are not usually randomly assigned
to groups. In addition, the researcher typically does not actually manipulate anything.
Rather, the researcher simply collects data on several variables and then conducts some
statistical analyses to determine how strongly different variables are related to each other.
For example, I may be interested in whether employee productivity is related to how much
employees sleep (at home, not on the job!). So I select a sample of 100 adult workers,
measure their productivity at work, and measure how long each employee sleeps on an
 Social Science Research Principles  ■   9

average night in a given week. I may find that there is a strong relationship between sleep
and productivity. Now, logically, I may want to argue that this makes sense because a more
rested employee will be able to work harder and more efficiently. Although this conclusion
makes sense, it is too strong a conclusion to reach based on my correlational data alone.
Correlational studies can only tell us whether variables are related to each other—they
cannot lead to conclusions about causality. After all, it is possible that being more pro-
ductive at work causes longer sleep at home. Getting one’s work done may relieve stress
and perhaps even allow the worker to sleep a little longer in the morning, both of which
create longer sleep duration.
Experimental research designs are good because they allow the researcher to isolate spe-
cific independent variables that may cause variation, or changes, in dependent variables.
In the example above, I manipulated the independent variable of the mathematics curric-
ulum and was able to reasonably conclude that the type of math curriculum used affected
students’ scores on the dependent variable, the test scores. The primary drawbacks of experi-
mental designs are that they are often difficult to accomplish in a clean way and they often
do not generalize to real-world situations. For example, in my study above, I cannot be sure
whether it was the math curricula that influenced the test scores or some other factor, such
as a preexisting difference in the mathematical abilities of the two groups or differences in
the teaching styles that had nothing to do with the curricula, but could have influenced
the test scores (e.g., the clarity or enthusiasm of the teacher). The strengths of correlational
research designs are as follows: they are often easier to conduct than experimental research,
allow for the relatively easy inclusion of many variables, and allow the researcher to examine
many variables simultaneously. The principal drawback of correlational research is that such
research does not allow for the careful controls necessary for drawing conclusions about
causal associations between variables.

Making Sense of Distributions and Graphs

Statisticians spend a lot of time talking about distributions. A distribution is simply a col-
lection of data, or scores, on a variable. Usually, these scores are arranged in order from the
smallest to largest, and then they can be presented graphically. Because distributions are so
important in statistics, I want to give them some attention early on in the book and show
you several examples of different types of distributions and how they are depicted in graphs.
Note that later in this book, there are whole chapters devoted to several of the most com-
monly used distributions in statistics, including the normal distribution (Chapters 4 and 5),
t distributions (Chapter 8 and parts of Chapter 7), F distributions (Chapters 9–11), and
chi-square distributions (Chapter 14).
Let’s begin with a simple example. Suppose that I am conducting a study of voters’ atti-
tudes and I select a random sample of 500 voters for my study. One piece of information I
might want to know is the political affiliation of the members of my sample. I ask them if
they are Republicans, Democrats, or Independents and I find that 45 percent of my sample
list themselves as Democrats, 40 percent report being Republicans, and 15 percent identify
themselves as Independents. Notice that political affiliation is a nominal, or categorical, vari-
able. Because nominal variables are variables with categories that have no numerical weight,
I cannot arrange my scores in this distribution from highest to lowest. The value of being a
Republican is not more or less than the value of being a Democrat or an Independent—they
are simply different categories. So rather than trying to arrange my data from the lowest to
the highest value, I simply leave them as separate categories and report the percentage of the
sample that falls into each category.
There are many different ways to graph this distribution, including a pie chart, bar graph,
column graph, different sized bubbles, and so on. The key to selecting the appropriate graphic
10  ■   Social Science Research Principles

FIGURE 1.4 Column graph showing the distribution of Republicans, Democrats, and Independents.

is to keep in mind that the purpose of the graph is to make the data easy to understand. For
my distribution of political affiliation, I have created two different graphs. Both are fine
choices because both offer very clear and concise summaries of the distribution and are easy
to understand. Figure 1.4 depicts the distribution as a column graph, and Figure 1.5 presents
the data in a pie chart. Which graphic is best for these data is a matter of personal prefer-
ence. As you look at Figure 1.4, notice that the X axis (the horizontal one) shows the party
affiliations: Democrats, Republicans, and Independents. The Y axis (the vertical one) shows
the percentage of the sample. You can see the percentages in each group and, just by quickly
glancing at the columns, you can see which political affiliation has the highest percentage of
this sample and get a quick sense of the differences between the party affiliations in terms
of the percentage of the sample. In my opinion, the pie chart in Figure 1.5 shows the same
information, but in a slightly more striking and simple manner.
Sometimes, researchers are interested in examining the distributions of more than one
variable at a time. For example, suppose I wanted to know about the association between
hours spent watching television and hours spent doing homework. I am particularly inter-
ested in how this association looks across different countries. So I collect data from samples
of high school students in several different countries. Now I have distributions on two differ-
ent variables across five different countries (the U.S., Mexico, China, Norway, and Japan). To
compare these different countries, I decide to calculate the average, or mean (see Chapter 2),
for each country on each variable. Then I graph these means using a column graph, as shown

FIGURE 1.5 Pie chart showing the distribution of Republicans, Democrats, and Independents.
 Social Science Research Principles  ■   11

FIGURE 1.6 Average hours of television viewed and time spent on homework in five countries.

in Figure 1.6 (note that these data are fictional—I made them up). As this graph clearly
shows, the disparity between the average amount of television watched and the average
hours of homework completed per day is widest in the U.S. and Mexico and virtually non-
existent in China. In Norway and Japan, high school students actually spend more time on
homework than they do watching TV, according to my fake data. Notice how easily this
complex set of data is summarized in a single graph.
Another common method of graphing a distribution of scores is the line graph, as shown
in Figure 1.7. Suppose that I select a random sample of 100 first-year college students who
have just completed their first term. I ask each of them to tell me the final grades they
received in each of their classes and then I calculate a grade point average (GPA) for each of
them. Finally, I divide the GPAs into six groups: 1–1.4, 1.5–1.9, 2.0–2.4, 2.5–2.9, 3.0–3.4,
and 3.5–4.0. When I count up the number of students in each of these GPA groups and
graph these data using a line graph, I get the results presented in Figure 1.7. Notice that
along the X axis, I have displayed the six different GPA groups. On the Y axis, I have the
frequency, typically denoted by the symbol f. In this graph, the Y axis shows how many
students are in each GPA group. A quick glance at Figure 1.7 reveals that there were quite
a few students (13) who really struggled in their first term in college, accumulating GPAs
between 1.0 and 1.4. Only one student was in the next group category: 1.5–1.9. From there,
the number of students in each GPA group generally goes up, with roughly 30 students in
the 2.0–2.9 GPA categories and about 55 students in the 3.0–4.0 GPA categories. A line
graph like this offers a quick way to see trends in data, either over time or across categories.
In this example with GPA, we can see that the general trend is to find more students in the

FIGURE 1.7 Line graph showing the frequency of students in different GPA groups.
12  ■   Social Science Research Principles

FIGURE 1.8 Bar graph showing the frequency of students in different GPA groups.

higher GPA categories, plus a fairly substantial group that is really struggling. In Figure 1.8,
the same data are presented in a bar graph. Which graph gives you a clearer picture of the data?
Column graphs are another method to show trends in data. In Figure 1.9, I present a
stacked column graph. This graph allows me to show several pieces of information in a
single graph. For example, in this graph, I am illustrating the occurrence of two differ-
ent kinds of crimes, property and violent, across the period from 1990 to 2007. On the
X axis, I have placed the years, moving from the earliest (1990) to latest (2007) as we
look from the left to the right. On the Y axis, I present the number of crimes committed
per 100,000 people in the U.S. When presented in this way, several interesting facts jump
out. First, the overall trend from 1990 to 2007 is a pretty dramatic drop in crime. From a
high of nearly 6,000 crimes per 100,000 people in 1991, the crime rate dropped to well
under 4,000 per 100,000 people in 2007. That is a drop of nearly 40 percent. The second
noteworthy piece of information that is obvious from the graph is that violent crimes (e.g.,
murder, rape, assault) occur much less frequently than crimes against property (e.g., burg-
lary, vandalism, arson) in each year of the study.
Notice that the graph presented in Figure 1.9 makes it easy to see that there has been a
drop in crime overall from 1990 to 2007, but it is not so easy to tell whether there has been
much of a drop in the violent crime rate. That is because violent crime makes up a much
smaller percentage of the overall crime rate than property crimes, so the scale used in the

FIGURE 1.9 Stacked column graph showing crime rates from 1990 to 2007.
 Social Science Research Principles  ■   13

FIGURE 1.10 Line graph showing crime rates from 1990 to 2007.

Y axis is pretty large. This makes the top of the columns, the parts representing violent crimes,
look quite small. To get a better idea of the trend for violent crimes over time, I created a new
graph, which is presented in Figure 1.10.
In this new figure, I have presented the exact same data that were presented in Figure 1.9,
this time as a line graph. The line graph separates violent crimes from property crimes com-
pletely, making it easier to see the difference in the frequency of the two types of crimes.
Again, this graph clearly shows the drop in property crime over the years. However, notice
that it is still difficult to tell whether there was much of a drop in violent crime over time. If
you look very closely, you can see that the rate of violent crime dropped from about 800 per
100,000 people in 1990 to about 500 per 100,000 people in 2007. This is an impressive drop
in the crime rate, but we have had to work too hard to see it. Remember: The purpose of a
graph is to make the interesting facts in the data easy to see. If you have to work hard to see
it, the graph is not that great.
The problem with Figure 1.10, just as with Figure 1.9, is that the scale on the Y axis is
too large to clearly show the trends for violent crime rates over time. To fix this problem, we
need a scale that is more appropriate for the violent crime rate data. I created one more graph
that includes the data for violent crimes only, without the property crime data (Figure 1.11).

FIGURE 1.11 Column graph showing violent crime rate from 1990 to 2007.
14  ■   Social Science Research Principles

Instead of using a scale from 0 to 6,000 or 7,000 on the Y axis, my new graph has a scale from
0 to 800 on the Y axis. In this new graph, a column graph, it is clear that the drop in violent
crimes from 1990 to 2007 was also quite dramatic.
Any collection of scores on a variable, regardless of the type of variable, forms a distri-
bution, and this distribution can be graphed. In this section of the chapter, several different
types of graphs have been presented, and all of them have their strengths. The key, when
creating graphs, is to select the graph that most clearly illustrates the data. When reading
graphs, it is important to pay attention to the details. Try to look beyond the most striking
features of the graph to the less obvious features, such as the scales used on the X and Y axes.
As I discuss later (Chapter 11), graphs can be quite misleading if the details are ignored.

Wrapping Up and Looking Forward

The purpose of this chapter was to provide a quick overview of the basic principles and
terminologies employed in social science research. With a foundation in the types of vari-
ables, experimental designs, and sampling methods used in social science research, it will
be easier to understand the uses of the statistics described in the remaining chapters of
this book. Now we are ready to talk statistics. It may still all be Greek to you, but that’s not
necessarily a bad thing.

 For work problems with answers, please check out the book’s Companion Website
here: www.routledge.com/cw/urdan

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theguardian.com/technolog y/2018/mar/17/facebook-cambridge-analytica-kogan-
data-algorithm
Granville, K. (2018, March 19). Facebook and Cambridge Analytica: What you need to know as
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facebook-cambridge-analytica-explained.html