Using R for Introductory Statistics

John Verzani

Chapman & Hall/CRC Press

2005

402 páginas

13h 24m

ISBN-10: 0203594703

This book started as a set of notes, titled “simpleR,” that were written to fill a gap in documentation for using R in an introductory statistics class. The College of Staten Island had been paying a per-seat fee to use a commercial statistics program. The cost of the program precluded widespread installation and curtailed accessibility. It was determined that the students would be better served if they could learn statistics with a software package that taught them good computer skills at the outset, could be installed all over campus and at home with relative ease, and was free to use. However, no suitable materials were available to accompany the class text. Hence, the basis for “simpleR”—a set of notes to accompany an in-class text. Now, as R gains wider acceptance, for pedagogic, style, and economic rea-sons, there is an increase, but no abundance, in available documentation. The adoption of R as the statistical software of choice when learning statistics depends on introductory materials. This book aims to serve the needs of students in introductory applied-statistics classes that are based on precalculus skills. An emphasis is put on finding simple-looking solutions, rather than clever ones. Certainly, this material could be covered more quickly (and is in other books such as those by Dalgaard, Fox, and Venables and Ripley). The goal here is to make it as accessible to student-learners as possible. This book aims to serve a hybrid purpose: to cover both statistical topics and the R software. Though the material stands alone, this book is also intended to be useful as an accompaniment to a standard introductory statistics book.