Stat-Spotting: A Field Guide to Identifying Dubious Data

Best, Joel

ISBN 10: 0520279980 / ISBN 13: 9780520279988

Published by University of California Press, 2013

About this Item

All orders ship by next business day! This is a used paperback book. Has wear on cover and/or pages. Book has no markings on pages. For USED books, we cannot guarantee supplemental materials such as CDs, DVDs, access codes and other materials. We are a small company and very thankful for your business! Seller Inventory # 4CNOOA002ABI

Bibliographic Details

Title: Stat-Spotting: A Field Guide to Identifying ...

Publisher: University of California Press

Publication Date: 2013

Binding: Soft cover

Condition: VeryGood

About this title

Synopsis:

Does a young person commit suicide every thirteen minutes in the United States? Are four million women really battered to death by their husbands or boyfriends each year? Is methamphetamine our number one drug problem today? Alarming statistics bombard our daily lives, appearing in the news, on the Web, seemingly everywhere. But all too often, even the most respected publications present numbers that are miscalculated, misinterpreted, hyped, or simply misleading.

This new edition contains revised benchmark statistics, updated resources, and a new section on the rhetorical uses of statistics, complete with new problems to be spotted and new examples illustrating those problems. Joel Best’s best seller exposes questionable uses of statistics and guides the reader toward becoming a more critical, savvy consumer of news, information, and data.

Entertaining, informative, and concise, Stat-Spotting takes a commonsense approach to understanding data and doesn't require advanced math or statistics.

From the Inside Flap:

"If you ever scan the newspaper, watch the TV news, or surf the blogs, you should read this charming book. If you're a journalist, read it twice."―James M. Jasper

"As we now swim in information, much of it bogus or biased, spotting dubious data is super important. In Stat-Spotting, Joel Best plays off the format of field guides to give readers good, common sense ways not only to sense bad data but to understand what's wrong. Broken up into short independent sections much like field guides to various flora or fauna, the book is easy and enjoyable to read. Easy, enjoyable, and valuable. I will recommend it to my students, and to others, as a resource for critical consumers of numbers."―Bernard Madison, University of Arkansas

"The purpose of Stat-Spotting is to help readers become more critical consumers of statistical claims. It is an important work addressing a significant problem in contemporary society: thoughtlessness about numerical claims. Best's work here provides a direct, accessible guide to critical readings of statistics."―Neil Lutsky, Carleton College