Ebook: Interpreting Quantitative Data

'Interpreting Quantitative Data' offers students a guide on how to interpret the complex reality of the social world, achieve effective measurement, understand the use of official statistics, use social surveys and apply linear modelling. Interpreting the Real and Describing the Complex: Why We Have to Measure -- The Nature of Measurement: What We Measure and How We Measure -- The State's Measurements: The Construction and Use of Official Statistics -- Measuring the Complex World: The Character of Social Surveys -- Probability and Quantitative Reasoning -- Interpreting Measurements: Exploring, Describing and Classifying -- Linear Modelling: Clues as to Causes -- Coping with Non-linearity and Emergence: Simulation and Neural Nets -- Qualitative Modelling: Issues of Meaning and Cause