This book describes the basis, application, and interpretation of statistics, and presents a wide range of univariate and multivariate statistical methodology. The Second Edition retains the unique feature of being written from the users' perspective; it connects statistical models and methods to investigative questions and background information, and connects statistical results with interpretations in plain English. In keeping with this approach, methods are grouped by usage rather than by commonality of statistical methodology.

This book explains the use of statistics in scientific investigations. It will be of interest to graduate students and researchers in many areas, including social science and life science.

1 The Importance of Statistics in an Information-Based World.- 2 Data: The Factual Information.- 3 Statistical Models: The Experimenter's View.- 4 Comparing Model and Data.- 5 Probability: A Fundamental Tool of Statistics.- 6 Some Widely Used Statistical Models.- 7 Some Important Statistics and Their Sampling Distributions.- 8 Statistical Analysis: The Statistician's View.- 9 Examining Proportions and Success Rates.- 10 Model and Data Checking.- 11 Questions About the "Average" Value.- 12 Comparing Two Groups, Treatments, or Processes.- 13 Comparative Studies, Surveys, and Designed Experiments.- 14 Comparing More Than Two Treatments or Groups.- 15 Comparing Mean Response When There Are Three or More Treatments.- 16 Comparing Patterns of Response: Frequency Tables.- 17 Studying Relations Between Variables.- 18 Prediction and Estimation: The Role of Explanatory Variables.- 19 Questions About Variability.- 20 Cause and Effect: Statistical Perspectives.- 21 Studying Changes in Response over Time.- A Tables for Some Common Probability Distributions.- A.1 The Normal Distribution.- A.3 The Chi-Squared Distribution.- References.