Finding & Using Statistics 

For this guide, when we talk about statistics we are going to be talking about what are called descriptive statistics – “How many? – How much? – What percent?” Someone else has collected the information; you will benefit from all their hard work.  Later on in your coursework, especially if you major in the social or health sciences, you will have the pleasure of taking an entire semester-long class devoted to statistics where you will learn about inferential statistics - median and mean, standard deviations, chi squares, analysis of variance, etc. But for now we are going to concentrate on statistics as finding “numbers of.”

However, numbers without context are meaningless. Numbers become valuable when you can compare one set against another. For purpose of this guide, statistics will be defined as comparative numerical information. We know that alcohol is responsible for many traffic deaths. In 1998, 15,935 American were killed in alcohol-related crashes. That number by itself does give us a very good picture of the problem of drinking and driving. If we know that in 1998 there was a total of 41,471 traffic fatalities in the U.S. and 15,935 – or 38.4 % - were alcohol related, we see that drinking does play a large part in traffic-related deaths.

And when we have more numbers to compare, we get an even better context–

Now that we can compare numbers, we can see trends and ask questions. The total number of alcohol-related fatalities has dropped steadily from 1985 to 1998, while the total number of traffic deaths has been fairly constant. Why, when less people are dying from alcohol-related accidents, are more people dying in other car accidents? (Is the total number of drivers increasing?). And why is the number of alcohol related deaths decreasing? (M.A.D.D.? Stiffer sentencing? Are Americans drinking less?). We are not going to answer our questions in this section, but just concentrate on finding the “numbers.”

Source for above statistics. United States. Bureau of the Census. Statistical Abstract of the United States: 2000. 
     Washington, D.C.: G.P.O., 2000.