Statistics for the Life Sciences

As a college student taking statistics again (I took it before in high school), this book is much better than my old high school textbook. The examples are clear and there are optional lessons for those who want to delve further in the reasoning behind statistical formulas. I disagree with a reviewer who said that this book does not explain the theory behind the statistics. Everything is explained thoroughly, or maybe I see it that way because I'm not a math major. If you're taking a statistics class to fulfill a general requirement (such as pre-med students), you're most likely not interested in knowing where the formula came from, and the explanations in this book are more than enough. I think it's more important to know how to apply the formulas to different situations, which is what this book demonstrates very well.

This textbook was required for my statistics class at the University of Wisconsin. I found the book easier to follow with better examples than my lecture was. Often I cannot learn anything right from the book, but this book made it easy with complete examples and simple descriptions of variables and theory. The book was so good, in fact, I rarely made it to class because I learned it better from the book!

In a word - wow. This is an outstanding textbook for undergraduate biology students. The number of practical, real life examples exceeds anything else I have seen in a statistics book, permitting the student to follow theory immediately with concrete practice. Examples are drawn from all axes of biology as well - physiology, biogeochemistry, pharmacology, microbiology, animal behaviour and more. I have been disappointed with previous textbooks which fall down in the following ways: 1) too much emphasis on the mathematics of calculation, or 2) lack of practical introductory treatment of moderately advanced topics which are nonetheless necessary to practitioners. This book for me strikes a very good balance between understanding the underpinnings without getting lost in equations, and getting your hands dirty with data in order to learn by example. Coverage is as wide as necessary today: introduction to logistic regression, and a clear treatment of interaction in two-way ANOVA. I do note that multiple regression is not touched. The sole drawback: sticker shock. It will be difficult for students to pay for a book that costs about $100 US. But at least you get what you pay for in this case.

I recently finished using Samuel's book in a dual level statistics course. As an undergraduate I found the material basic and extremely easy to follow. From the perspective of a student who has never had a formal statistics course, I found this book to be simple. Problems are relevant to the life sciences. I perhaps expected more challenging concepts and problems to have been presented-a bit disappointing.

Great examples, great problems, and a great writer sum up this book written by a Purdue Professor. If you deal with statistics and have a career in the health sciences, this is the book for you.