Inferential statistics

Inferential statistics allow you to go beyond simply describing data to drawing meaningful inferences from it. There are a number of different inferential statistics, and each is used under slightly different circumstances. Which one you choose will depend on the type of data collected, the question you are asking, and your study design.

This section will introduce you to the theory underlying many of these statistics, and will show you when and how to use them to evaluate data in practice.

Introducing inferential statistics

Find out how inferential tests are used to test hypotheses, and the statistics used to evaluate the significance and size of any effect

Comparing two groups

Learn about the tests used to identify differences between groups or conditions in your data

Relationships and associations

The tests in this section are used to identify relationships and associations between variables

Comparing multiple groups or conditions

Learn about ANOVA, a family of analyses that allows you to evaluate data from more than two groups or conditions

Dimensional scales

Learn about Factor Analysis, a method of reducing lots of variables (such as the items in a questionnaire) down into a smaller set of 'factors'.