Inferential statistics are the statistical procedures that are used to reach conclusions about associations between variables They differ from descriptive statistics in that they are explicitly designed to test hypotheses

With hypothesis testing, one uses a test such as T-Test, Chi-Square, or ANOVA to test whether a hypothesis about the mean is true or not I’ll leave it at that Again, the point is that this is an inferential statistic method to reach conclusions about a population, based on a sample set of data

With inferential statistics, you take data from samples and make generalizations about a population For example, you might stand in a mall and ask a sample of 100 people if they like shopping at Sears

The other purpose of inferential statistics is to be able to generalize the results from the sample of people in the study to the entire population, where the term population means everyone we are interested in, such as those who will most likely vote in the next election, or people who suffer from a particular

They help us understand and describe the aspects of a specific set of data by providing brief observations and summaries about the sample, which can help identify pattern

Methods used in descriptive statistics The types of descriptive statistics which can be used in nursing research will be considered here according to their main purposes: as means for representing data coherently, as methods for summarising the main features or characteristics of a data set, and as ways in which the

Descriptive analytics uses a lot of data visualization to help answer specific questions or identify patterns of care, thus providing a broader view for evidence-based clinical practice

Interpret the key results for Descriptive Statistics

1. Step 1: Describe the size of your sample
2. Step 2: Describe the center of your data
3. Step 3: Describe the spread of your data
4. Step 4: Assess the shape and spread of your data distribution
5. Compare data from different groups

Descriptive statistics help you to simplify large amounts of data in a meaningful way It reduces lots of data into a summary Example 2: You’ve performed a survey to 40 respondents about their favorite car color

Inferential statistics involves mathematical procedures that allow psychologists to make inferences about collected data For example, these procedures might be used to estimate the likelihood that the collected data occurred by chance (that is, to make probability predictions)

The 3 main types of descriptive statistics concern the frequency distribution, central tendency, and variability of a dataset

• Univariate statistics summarize only one variable at a time
• Bivariate statistics compare two variables
• Multivariate statistics compare more than two variables

The correlation coefficient is a simple descriptive statistic that measures the strength of the linear relationship between two interval- or ratio-scale variables (as opposed to categorical, or nominal-scale variables), as might be visualized in a scatter plot

Keyboard Shortcuts

• Step 1: State the Null Hypothesis
• Step 2: State the Alternative Hypothesis
• Step 3: Set
• Step 4: Collect Data
• Step 5: Calculate a test statistic
• Step 6: Construct Acceptance / Rejection regions
• Step 7: Based on steps 5 and 6, draw a conclusion about

• Step 1: Specify the Null Hypothesis
• Step 2: Specify the Alternative Hypothesis
• Step 3: Set the Significance Level (a)
• Step 4: Calculate the Test Statistic and Corresponding P-Value
• Step 5: Drawing a Conclusion