Statistics I

Full course description

The world of statistics is extremely useful, and there’s no need to be afraid of it. With 90% confidence and a good deal of effort, you would rather shock the world of statistics. Numbers would bow to your understanding; quantitative reports in journals and the media would be no match for your critical eye. In Statistics I, you shall walk your first steps on the path towards mastery of statistics.

This course takes what is known as a classical approach to statistics and quantitative research methods for social and life sciences. It starts with descriptive statistics (getting the hang of a sample) and continues with inferential statistics (generalising sample results to entire populations). But don’t mistake ‘classical’ for ‘traditional’. Statistics deserves to be colourful and exciting, so prepare yourself for a course full of relatable and relevant stories. Our goal is to make you fall in love with a field that you never knew you liked. By the end, you will know how to visualise and summarise variables, test null hypotheses, construct confidence intervals, and capture associations between categorical as well as quantitative types of data. And you will be excited that you now understand everything the previous sentence said.

Learning statistics is all about interacting with it. Throughout the six course modules, you will solve a myriad of assignments that will help you build – and trust – a quantitative intuition. You will learn many ways in which statistics can help us make sense of the world… and where its limits lie. The overarching goal is to build bridges between mathematical models and our actual universe, in order to make the latter a better place. Who wouldn’t want to take part in that endeavour? Now is your chance. We hope to see you in class!