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The College
of St. Scholastica Library Lab
Worksheet
Five: Statistics & the Internet |
For this lab, when we talk about
statistics we are going to be talking about what are called descriptive
statistics – “How many? – How much? – What percent?” Someone else has collected
the information; you will benefit from all their hard work. Later
on in your coursework, especially if you major in the social or health
sciences, you will have the pleasure of taking an entire semester-long
class devoted to statistics where you will learn about inferential statistics
- median and mean, standard deviations, chi squares, analysis of
variance, etc. But for now we are going to concentrate on statistics as
finding “numbers of.”
However, numbers without context
are meaningless. Numbers become valuable when you can compare one set against
another. For purpose of this Lab, statistics will be defined as comparative
numerical information. We know that alcohol is responsible for many
traffic deaths. In 1998, 15,935 American were killed in alcohol-related
crashes. That number by itself does give us a very good picture of the
problem of drinking and driving. If we know that in 1998 there was a total
of 41,471 traffic fatalities in the U.S. and 15,935 – or 38.4 % - were
alcohol related, we see that drinking does play a large part in traffic-related
deaths.
And when we have more numbers
to compare, we get an even better context–
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1985
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1992
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1995
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1998
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Total traffic
fatalities
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43,825
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39,250
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41,817
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41,471
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Alcohol related
fatalities
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22,716
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17,858
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17,247
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15,935
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% of total fatalities
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51.8%
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45.5%
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41.2%
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38.4%
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Now that we can compare numbers,
we can see trends and ask questions. The total number of alcohol-related
fatalities has dropped steadily from 1985 to 1998, while the total number
of traffic deaths has been fairly constant. Why, when less people are dying
from alcohol-related accidents, are more people dying in other car accidents?
(Is the total number of drivers increasing?). And why is the number of
alcohol related deaths decreasing? (M.A.D.D.? Stiffer sentencing? Are Americans
drinking less?). We are not going to answer our questions in this section
(that is what you can be working on with the other parts of the Lab) but
just concentrate on finding the “numbers.”
Source for above statistics.
United States. Bureau of the Census. Statistical Abstract of the United
States: 2000.
Washington,
D.C.: G.P.O., 2000.
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