Descriptive and Inferential Statistics

Descriptive statistics deals with the description and summary of data.

• Goal: Identification of patterns, trends, and characteristic features of the data.
• Methods: Measures of central tendency, dispersion, charts, graphical representations.

Example:

Suppose we have a list of student grades in a course. Descriptive statistics could be used to calculate the mean, standard deviation, and create a histogram to visualize the distribution of grades.

Inferential Statistics

Inferential statistics deals with drawing conclusions about a population based on sample data.

• Goal: Drawing conclusions about a population based on limited sample data.
• Methods: Statistical tests, confidence intervals, hypothesis testing.

Example:

Let's say we have a sample of student grades, and we want to make a statement about the average of all students in the class based on this sample. In this case, we could use inferential statistics to calculate a confidence interval for the true average of the entire class.