Overview of Statistics

Statistics provides the reasoning and the methods for producing and understanding data. Statisticians are specialists, but statistics by its nature demands that they be generalists also.

Mathematics and Computers Are Involved

Statistics uses mathematics, but it is not abstract or isolated: statisticians work with people from other professional backgrounds to solve practical problems. Statistics uses modern computing to organize and analyze data, and statisticians command specialized tools, but the emphasis is on the data to be understood and the problem to be solved rather than on computing for its own sake.

... But Understanding the Data Is Crucial

Statisticians must know more than statistics. A statistician who works in medicine or in a manufacturing plant or in market research must learn enough medicine or engineering or marketing to understand the data in their setting. Statisticians need the ability to work with other people, to listen, and to communicate.