The Sage Dictionary of Statistics

Abstract

Writing a dictionary of statistics is one thing – writing a practical dictionary of statistics is another. The entries had to be useful, not merely accurate. Accuracy is not that useful on its own. One aspect of the practicality of this dictionary is in facilitating the learning of statistical techniques and concepts. The dictionary is not intended to stand alone as a textbook – there are plenty of those. We hope that it will be more important than that. Perhaps only the computer is more useful. Learning statistics is a complex business. Inevitably, students at some stage need to supplement their textbook. A trip to the library or the statistics lecturer’s office is daunting. Getting a statistics dictionary from the shelf is the lesser evil. And just look at the statistics textbook next to it – you probably outgrew its usefulness when you finished the first year at university. Few readers, not even ourselves, will ever use all of the entries in this dictionary.