Assignment no.

1
I. Make a list of at least 5 mathematician or scientist that contributes in the field of statistics. State
their contributions

Ronald A. Fisher (1890-1962) is considered the father of modern statistics along with Karl Pearson. It
was Fisher who laid the groundwork for much of experimental design, statistical inference, and the
procedure known as Analysis of Variance (ANOVA). Fisher argued for the concept of randomization in
experimental design and proposed the now conventional use of p-values of .05 as a threshold for
statistical significance. Fisher also developed the maximum likelihood method of estimation (i.e.,
estimating parameters of a statistical model given observations).

Edwards Deming (1900-1993) developed the concept of quality control. He was instrumental in assisting
post-WWII Japan rise as a world power in the industry, given his expertise in systems and systems
thinking. Deming also taught industry leaders how to put their focus on both internal groups and
external groups, and how they relate to and work with each other – a form of collaboration so
fundamental in research endeavors today.

Gertrude Cox (1900-1978) was among the famous statisticians to experience many “firsts.” Cox was the
first recipient of Iowa State’s master’s degree in statistics. She was the first full female professor as well
as the first female department head at North Carolina State College in 1941, founding the Department
of Experimental Statistics. She was also the first woman elected to membership in the National Academy
of Sciences in 1975. Cox viewed statisticians as “partners in science” – a validation of statistician John
Tukey’s statement: “the best thing about being a statistician is that you get to play in everyone’s
backyard.” Another of Cox’s significant contributions to statistics was championing the use of computers
for analysis.

John Tukey (1915-2000) could certainly be described as one of the great statisticians; his own
contributions to statistics were wide-ranging and numerous. He coined the term “bit” from binary digit
as well as the term “software.” He is known for robust methods, graphing, and creating the ubiquitous
box plot (introduced in his classic book Exploratory Data Analysis). The Tukey Range Test is employed
often in ANOVA when doing multiple comparison procedures (testing if means differ significantly).

George Box (1919-2013) was a British chemist who considered himself an “accidental statistician.” He
was called upon as a sergeant in WWII to study the effects of poisonous gases. Studying under Fisher, he
developed expertise in data transformations, developing the Box-Cox transformation (transforming non-
normal dependent variables into a normal shape). He may also be best known for his statement,
“essentially all models are wrong, but some are useful.” This was not intended as an indictment, but
rather, the need to ensure that model results could be applied to everyday life.

Janet Norwood (1923-2015) was the first female commissioner of the US Bureau of Labor Statistics
(appointed in 1979 by Carter and re-appointed twice by Reagan). She had a leading role in the
enhancement of critical government statistics such as Consumer Price Index (CPI) and unemployment.
She was elected the president of the American Statistical Association in 1989 and was a senior fellow in
both the Urban Institute and the New York Conference Board, a think tank established in 1916.
II. With your knowledge of statistics, give a real life situation how statistics is applied. Expand
your answer.

1) Medical Study

Statistics are used behind all the medical study. Statistic help doctors keep track of where the baby
should be in his/her mental development. Physician’s also use statistics to examine the effectiveness of
treatments.

2) Weather Forecasts

Statistics are very important for observation, analysis and mathematical prediction models. Weather
forecast models are built using statistics that compare prior weather conditions with current weather to
forecast future weather conditions.

3) Quality Testing

A company makes thousands of products every day and make sure that they sold the best quality items.
For a company it is not possible to test each product. So the company uses quality test with the help of
statistics.

4) Stock Market

The stock market also uses statistical computer models for stock analysis. Stock analysts get the
information about economy using statistics concepts.

5) Consumer Goods

Retailers keeps track of everything they sell and to know the stock using statistics. Worldwide leading
retailers use statistics to calculate what products ship to each store and when.

Conclusion

Statistics are an important part of our lives. Help your children with statistics word problems so that
they will understand the real life role of statistics. With the help of statistics we can know what
happened in the past and what may occur in the future.

III. When can a variable be considered independent and dependent? Give an example for your
answer
example 1: You want to figure out which brand of microwave popcorn pops the most kernels so you can
get the most value for your money. You test different brands of popcorn to see which bag pops the most
popcorn kernels.
 Independent Variable: Brand of popcorn bag (It's the independent variable because you are
actually deciding the popcorn bag brands)
 Dependent Variable: Number of kernels popped (This is the dependent variable because it's
what you measure for each popcorn brand)
 
example 2: You want to see which type of fertilizer helps plants grow fastest, so you add a different
brand of fertilizer to each plant and see how tall they grow.
 Independent Variable: Type of fertilizer given to the plant
 Dependent Variable: Plant height

Summary: Independent vs Dependent Variable

Knowing the independent variable definition and dependent variable definition is key to
understanding how experiments work. The independent variable is what you change, and the
dependent variable is what changes as a result of that. You can also think of the independent
variable as the cause and the dependent variable as the effect.

When graphing these variables, the independent variable should go on the x-axis (the horizontal
axis), and the dependent variable goes on the y-axis (vertical axis).

Constant variables are also important to understand. They are what stay the same throughout the
experiment so you can accurately measure the impact of the independent variable on the
dependent variable.