Statistcs-behaviorl Scientists · Psychology
the basics of statistical knowledge(different forms of hypothesis tests, different ways of describing data both descriptively and inferentially, nonparametric tests, etc)
Learned a great deal on the fundamentals of statistics as it relates to behavioral scientists. Topics included: basic tenants of statistics, variables of measurement, how to visualize data, varying kinds of null hypothesis statistical testings (bootstrapping, permutations, linear regressions, binomial tests, z-tests, t-tests, rank sum test, chi-square test, ANOVA, etc.), was exposed to the limitations of statistics and computer learning, effect size and power (this is vital for data literacy so I wish that it was covered more), and bayesian statistics was touched on. Get ready to use R!
homework each week of varying length, but involves basically teaching yourself concepts so is more difficult than necessary
No real homework. Labs are easily completed in the allotted lab time. 3 midterms are easy if you follow the book. Final was as if she had pulled it from another year: lots of terms and perspectives we had not covered...puzzling.
3 quizzes and a final; weekly problem sets
Learned basics of statistics as they related to real world examples
Stats formulas, statistical thinking and basic R coding.
Although he's great and seems like a professor who a) cares about his subject matter and b) cares about his students, he ends up going into minute detail on the easiest concepts that most people have already had from any high school math class, and skims in a very confusing manner over more complex subjects that are nonetheless tested on/the subject of homework. Lab is alright, but its two hours of excel and SPSS and if you understand how to use them (aka how to follow step by step instructions) you might as well stay home.
This is a frustrating class. The lectures are worthless, unless you're a fan of the absurd. Graham rambles on and on about stats and goes off on compounding tangents until no one knows what got them there. You're better off just following the great textbook. I tried very hard to follow the lectures for the first half of the semester, but ended up just doing problems and reading the text to prepare for exams. The labs are easy and don't really teach you anything beyond a few basic commands in STATA. Grades seem arbitrary. She and the TAs are quite cagey about how grades were determined and whether or not a curve was in effect. You got a lot of "the mean score on the exam was ___", but not a lot of explanation about how your grade would be tabulated. Oh and you have to give the exams back once you see your grade. WTF? All that being said, Norma herself is the sweetest, most supportive professor you could ask for. Just go to her office hours and you will be treated to sage advice and someone who genuinely cares about your story. She takes note, FFS. She would be a great psych adviser, but holy hell, keep her away from this intro stats class
John Daws did an excellent job teaching what some may find a dry subject. Although class felt like it dragged on and on, Daws was always well prepared (powerpoint slides), welcomed questions and was EXTREMELY patient answering questions. Daws knows the material really well and uses examples to help explain concepts. I attended 100% of the lectures and do not recall Daws ever being late.