Statistics for Business and Economics, Revised (with Printed Access Card)

About This Edition

New Features

• Updated and Upsized Excel^® Coverage
  Get the latest coverage of Excel^® 2010 and related materials throughout the text, including revised, end-of-chapter appendices on Chart Tools, PivotTable Report, and PivotChart Report, as well as spreadsheets, dialog boxes, examples, screen shots, and more. Plus, expanded Excel^® coverage is available as optional appendices to the text. Choose Microsoft^® Excel^® 2010 and Minitab^® 16, as well as popular Excel^® add-ins PrecisionTree^® 2010 and StatTools^® 2010.


• Revised, Rewritten, and Refocused Chapters
  Students will get more out of the statistics course with an enhanced chapter on Nonparametric Methods and their Counterparts, which includes new appendices for use with Minitab^®, Excel^®, and StatTools^®. A clarified chapter on Time Series Analysis and Forecasting helps students select the right forecasting method, while the chapter on Sampling Material now addresses sampling populations and frames, and offers a practical advice section.


• Emerging Fields, Emerging Issues
  A new introduction to data mining and data warehousing examines the importance of this relatively new field and how it relies on statistics and computer science to create value for businesses. And, as ethical issues become increasingly significant for modern businesses, the text's authors respond with new material that addresses professional responsibility in presenting and interpreting statistical information.


• Improved Clarity and Ease of Understanding
  Revising with students in mind, the authors have simplified coverage of box plots to emphasize quick and easy comparisons between two or more data sets. Students will also appreciate clarifications to discussions on hypothesis testing, including identifying the null and alternative hypotheses, and helpful changes in terminology to more accurately describe data.


• Added Case Problems, Features, Examples, and More
  Several new case problems allow students to analyze a variety of data and prepare managerial reports, while "Statistics in Practice" vignettes grab students' attention at the start of each chapter and set the pace for the topics that follow. The more than 350 real data examples and exercises throughout the text--150 of which are new to this edition--come from world-class sources such as The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and Barron's, and demonstrate the importance of statistical analysis in business and economics today.

Additional Features

• Useful Cumulative Standard Normal Distribution Table
  This important table prepares students to use computer software in statistics by introducing normal distribution probabilities, and helps first-time users calculate normal probability and p-values for hypothesis testing.


• Trusted, Expert Authors
  As prominent, respected leaders and active business consultants in statistics, authors David R. Anderson, Dennis J. Sweeney, and Thomas A. Williams provide an accurate, thorough, reliable presentation of the concepts with every edition of the text.


• Leading Approaches, Proven Methods
  A hallmark strength of the text, the problem-scenario approach shows students the practical side of techniques through the use of applications, providing insights into business decision-making and how statistics influences it. Further, the authors' systematic approach to learning statistics, which involves first developing a computational foundation and techniques before moving on to application and interpretation, helps students better understand the material.


• Simplified Introduction to P-Values
  Emphasizing the use of p-values as the preferred approach to hypothesis testing, the authors now separate a simplified conceptual definition of p-values from operational definitions that clarify how the p-value is computed for a lower-tail test, an upper-tail test, and a two-tail test. Students also learn how to use software to compute p-values, and an available, optional appendix clearly demonstrates how to use Minitab^® and Excel^® to compute p-values associated with z, t, and F test statistics.