Statistics
is the science of making effective use of numerical data relating to
groups of individuals or experiments. It deals with all aspects of this,
including not only the collection, analysis and interpretation of such
data, but also the planning of the collection of data, in terms of the
design of surveys and experiments.
A statistician is someone who
is particularly versed in the ways of thinking necessary for the
successful application of statistical analysis. Often such people have
gained this experience after starting work in any of a number of fields.
Statistical procedures may form the basis of positivist methodology in
social sciences such as sociology. There is also a discipline called
mathematical statistics, which is concerned with the theoretical basis
of the subject.
The word statistics can either be singular or
plural.When it refers to the discipline, "statistics" is singular, as in
"Statistics is an art." When it refers to quantities (such as mean and
median) calculated from a set of data, statistics is plural, as in
"These statistics are misleading."
