Statistical Methods for Research Workers

Statistical Methods for Research Workers is a classic book on statistics, written by the statistician R. A. Fisher. It is considered by some^[who?] to be one of the 20th century's most influential books on statistical methods, together with his The Design of Experiments (1935). It was originally published in 1925, by Oliver & Boyd (Edinburgh);^[1] the final and posthumous 14th edition was published in 1970.

Ronald Fisher

Reviews

According to Denis Conniffe:

Ronald A. Fisher was "interested in application and in the popularization of statistical methods and his early book Statistical Methods for Research Workers, published in 1925, went through many editions and motivated and influenced the practical use of statistics in many fields of study. His Design of Experiments (1935) [promoted] statistical technique and application. In that book he emphasized examples and how to design experiments systematically from a statistical point of view. The mathematical justification of the methods described was not stressed and, indeed, proofs were often barely sketched or omitted altogether ..., a fact which led H. B. Mann to fill the gaps with a rigorous mathematical treatment in his well-known treatise, Mann (1949)."^[2]

Chapters

• Prefaces

1. Introduction
2. Diagrams
3. Distributions
4. Tests of Goodness of Fit, Independence and Homogeneity; with table of χ²
5. Tests of Significance of Means, Difference of Means, and Regression Coefficients
6. The Correlation Coefficient
7. Intraclass Correlations and the Analysis of Variance
8. Further Applications of the Analysis of Variance

• SOURCES USED FOR DATA AND METHODS INDEX

In the second edition of 1928 a chapter 9 was added: The Principles of Statistical Estimation.

See also

• The Design of Experiments

Notes

1. Scanned version of Statistical Methods first edition
2. Conniffe, Denis (1990–1991). "R. A. Fisher and the development of statistics—a view in his centenary year". Journal of the Statistical and Social Inquiry Society of Ireland. Vol. XXVI, no. 3. Dublin: Statistical and Social Inquiry Society of Ireland. p. 87. hdl:2262/2764. ISSN 0081-4776.

• Mann, H. B. (1949). Analysis and design of experiments: Analysis of variance and analysis of variance designs. New York, N. Y.: Dover Publications, Inc. pp. x+195. MR 0032177.

Further reading

• The March 1951 issue of the Journal of the American Statistical Association contains articles celebrating the 25th anniversary of the publication of the first edition.
• A.W.F. Edwards (2005) "R. A. Fisher, Statistical Methods for Research Workers, 1925," in I. Grattan-Guinness (ed) Landmark Writings in Western Mathematics: Case Studies, 1640-1940, Amsterdam: Elsevier.
• Savage, Leonard J. (1976). "On Rereading R. A. Fisher". Annals of Statistics. 4 (3): 441–500. doi:10.1214/aos/1176343456.

Reviews

• Nature anonymous review of Fisher’s Statistical Methods
• BMJ anonymous review of Fisher’s Statistical Methods
• Student’s review of Fisher’s Statistical Methods
• Egon Pearson’s reviews of Fisher’s Statistical Methods
• Harold Hotelling’s review of Fishers’ Statistical Methods
• Leon Isserlis’s review of Fishers’ Statistical Methods
• W. P. Elderton’sreview of Fisher’s Statistical Methods

External links

• Text of first edition
• The 14th edition (prepared from notes left by Fisher when he died in 1962) is reprinted as the first part of Statistical Methods, Experimental Design and Scientific Inference