Bangladesh university

Subject code:soc-2201
Assignment name: Assignment on social statistics

Submitted to
Umme Rezowana (lecturer)
Bangladesh University
Department of sociology

Submitted by
Name: Md. Rabiul Islam
Roll: 201711636016
Batch:36 th
Dep: Sociology
Date of submission :22/10/2020
 Assignment on social statistics

Definition of social statistics : Social statistics is the use of statistics to study human
behaviour and social environments. Social statistics data is information or knowledge on an
individual, object or event. Statistics are numbers, summaries of patterns and can also be
probabilities.
Statistical analysis can include the design and collection of data, its interpretation and
presentation.
Social statistics and quantitative data analysis are key tools for understanding society and social
change. We can try to capture people’s attitudes and map patterns in behaviour and
circumstances using numbers and also describe how people and populations change
Data can be numerical values or text, sounds or images, memories or perceptions.
Often the concept of data suggests information that has been through some kind of processing
and having a structure. However, many examples of new types of data have very different and
often unstructured formats; for example, millions of tweets or thousands of PDFs of public
documents.

Huge quantities of data on people, organisations and social groups are collected each day, across
the world. As social statisticians, it is our role to analyse and make sense of the huge volumes
and sources of data using hypothesis-driven social research.

Social scientists use social statistics for many purposes, including:

 the evaluation of the quality of services available to a group or organization,

 analyzing behaviors of groups of people in their environment and special situations,

 determining the wants of people through statistical sampling.

Understanding society
Social statistics are a means of investigating and testing research questions and policy impacts
across different areas of people’s lives. These observations help our understanding of society,
research questions include:
 1. How are populations growing?

2. Are wealthy people happier?

3. Is society becoming more tolerant of diversity?

4. How do people cope with financial hardship?

5. Do people with higher qualifications earn more?

6. Does volunteering increase your sense of wellbeing?

Social statistics are a means of investigating and testing research questions and policy impacts
across different areas of people’s lives.
Social statistics in the real world
The United Nations Social Statistics Division analyses differences among social groups and
countries covering such issues as housing, health, education, conditions of work and
employment.
It pays special attention to the study of conditions of special population groups, including
children, the elderly, the unemployed, and people with disabilities.
Compare the facts
Social statistics are also used to compare data from before and after a policy intervention.
For example, we need statistics to measure poverty in the first place and we then may want to
assess the impact and costs of a policy providing financial support to families living in poverty.
Patterns and relations
Statistical analysis techniques can be used to explore patterns and underlying relationships in
data sets, such as:
1. in relation to people’s responses to multiple questions in a survey;

2. to take account of aspects of people's circumstances such as the unemployment rates of

where they live; or

3. the educational standards of the class and/or school they are studying in;

4. change can also be measured through longitudinal surveys where people are interviewed
at different points during their lives.
Statistical testing and modelling techniques can be used to generalise from small samples to
larger populations, for example:
1. predicting the outcome of an election;

2. attitudes towards the economy in a country.

Probability tests can be used to identify the key factor(s) associated with a particular outcome or
behaviour. For example, are older people more likely to be worried about being a victim of crime
than younger people once you have taken account of their family status, education, job and the
type of area they live in?
Statistics and employability
Skills in analysing data and using statistics are vital across the research areas of population
change, health, family life, the economy, well-being, education, employment, law and criminal
justice, housing and civic participation.
Even if you are primarily using qualitative data, skills in understanding the bigger picture can
add to the explanatory power of your empirical research.
For example, a study of long-term unemployment based around qualitative interviews can be
strengthened by a quantitative summary of the patterns and duration of unemployment at the
local, national land international level and how these patterns have changed over time.
Statistics in the social sciences

Statistics and statistical analyses have become a key feature of social science. Statistics is
employed in economics, psychology, political science, sociology and anthropology. There is a
debate regarding the uses and value of statistical methods in social science, especially in political
science, with some statisticians questioning practices such as data dredging that can lead to
unreliable policy conclusions of political partisans who overestimate the interpretive power that
non-robust statistical methods such as simple and multiple linear regression allow. Indeed, an
important axiom that social scientists cite, but often forget, is that "correlation does not
imply causation." For example, it appears widely accepted that the lower numbers of women in
decision making positions in politics, business and science is good evidence of gender
discrimination. But where men suffer adverse statistical indicators such as greater imprisonment
rates or a higher suicide rate, that is not usually accepted as evidence of gender bias acting
against them.
The use of statistics has become so widespread in the social sciences that many universities such
as Harvard, have developed institutes focusing on "quantitative social science."
Harvard's Institute for Quantitative Social Science focuses mainly on fields like political
science that incorporate the advanced causal statistical models that Bayesian methods provide.
However, some experts in causality feel that these claims of causal statistics are overstated,
Statistical methods in social sciences

Methods, techniques and concepts used in quantitative social sciences include:

 Structural Equation Modeling and factor analysis

 Multilevel models
 Cluster analysis
 Latent class model
 Item response theory
 Survey methodology and survey sampling

Examples of Social Statistics

 birth rate
 marriage records
 mortality rate
 suicide: 
The above definition covers the following statistical tools
Collection of data:  This is the first step in a statistical study and is the foundation of
statistical analysis.  Therefore, the data should be collected by the investigator himself or
obtained from reliable published or unpublished sources.

Organization of data: Data that are collected by an investigator need to be organized by

editing, coding, classifying and tabulating.

Presentation of data: Data collected and organized are presented in some systematic manner
to make statistical analysis easier.  The organized data could be presented with the help of table,
graphs and diagrams etc.

Analysis of Data: The next stage is the analysis of presented data.  There are large numbers
of methods used for analysis the data such as averages, dispersion, correlation etc.
Interpretation of Data:  Interpretation of data implies the drawing of conclusions on the
basic of data analyzed in the earlier stage.  On the basis of conclusion certain decisions can be
taken.

Functions of Social Statistics

Statistics simplifies complex data: With the help of statistical methods a mass of data ban
be presented in such a manner that they become easy to understand.

Statistics Presents the facts in a definite form: The definiteness is achieved by stating

conclusions in a numerical or quantitative form.

Statistics provides a technique of comparison: Comparison is an important function of

statistics for example comparison of data of different class, categories etc., are helpful for
drawing conclusion about social and economic change.

Statistics studies relationship: Correlation analysis is used to discover relationship

between different phenomenon’s.  For example relationship between supply and demand, cost
and benefit,  illiteracy and unemployment etc.

Statistics helps in formulating policies: Social policies such as health, education,

population, rehabilitation policy etc. are formed on the basis of statistically collected data.  Some
laws such or Malthus theory of population and Engel's law of family expenditure is also based on
statistics.

Statistics helps in forecasting: Statistics also helps to predict the further behaviour of

phenomenon such as population stabilization of India by 2035 is predicted on the basis of
available statistics of past and present.

Statistics helps in testing and formulating theories: When some theory is to be tested,

statistical data and techniques are useful.  For example, whether cigarette smoking causes cancer,
whether demand increase affects the price, can be tested by collecting and composing the
relevant data.

Limitations of Statistic
Statistics are widely used in all science and social work profession but it is not without
limitations. The following are the limitations of statistics:
It does not study qualitative aspect of a problem: The most important condition of
statistical inquiry is that subject of investigation and inquiry should be capable of being
quantitatively measured.  Qualitative phenomenon cannot be studied in statistics unless these
attributes are expressed in terms of numerical.

It does not study individuals: Individual values of observation have no importance in

statistics because statistics is the study of mass data and deals with aggregates of facts.   For
example, the income of a family is say Rs. 10,000 does not convey statistical meaning while the
average income of 100 families say Rs. 4,00 is statistical statement.

Statistical laws are true only on an average: Laws of statistics are not universally
applicable like the laws of physics and mathematics.  They are true on an average because the
results are affected by a large number of causes.  The ultimate results obtained by statistical
analysis are true under certain circumstances only.

Statistics can be misused: Statistics liable to be misused.  The result obtained can be

manipulated according to ones own criteria and such manipulated results can mislead the
community.

Statistics simply is one of the methods of studying a phenomenon: statistical

calculations are simple expression which should be supplemented by other methods for a
complete comprehension of the results. Thus, statistics is the only means and not the end.

Statistical results lack mathematical accuracy:  The results drawn from statistical

analysis are normally in approximate.  As the statistical analysis is based on observation of mass
data, number of inaccuracies may be present and it is difficult to rectify them.  Therefore, these
results are estimates rather than exact statements.  Statistical studies are a failure in the field
where one hundred percent accuracy is desired.
References
1. ^ Pearl, Judea 2001, Bayesianism and Causality, or, Why I am only a Half-Bayesian,
Foundations of Bayesianism, Kluwer Applied Logic Series, Kluwer Academic Publishers, Vol
24, D. Cornfield and J. Williamson (Eds.) 19-36.

2. ^ ftp.cs.ucla.edu/pub/stat_ser/r284-reprint.pdf

External links
Social statisticsat Wikipedia's sister projects

7. Textbooks from Wikibooks

8. Data from Wikidata

5. Statistics at Curlie

Social science statistics centers

3. Center for Statistics and Social Sciences, University of Washington

4. Center for the Promotion of Research Involving Innovative Statistical Methodology, New York
University, NY

5. Centre for Research Methods, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Helsinki, Finland

6. Cornell Institute for Social and Economic Research

7. Harvard Institute for Quantitative Social Science

8. Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research

9. National Centre for Research Methods, UK

10. Odum Institute for Research in Social Sciences, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

11. Social Science Statistics Center, University of