Statistics and Data Analysis for Human Biologists

After completing the course the student is expected to:

Knowledge

• describe the role of descriptive statistics and refer to appropriate statistical summary measures for different types of data
• explain the mechanism of statistical inference, and refer to confidence interval and p-value for drawing evidence-based conclusions
• rephrase statistical significance and statistical power in the context of a given laboratory experiment
• understand the basic idea of how to design and carry out a study where data are collected and conclusions are based on statistical analysis of the data
• reflect on limitations of the conclusions obtained with respect to study design, measurement error and sample size 
   

Skills

• power and sample size calculation for an experimental study
• communicate results of statistical analysis
• present subject matter hypotheses and data
• argue for the selected statistical methods 
• discuss the statistical results 
   

Competencies

• critically review public reports
• review all steps from study design, data collection to subject matter conclusion
• learn from the limitations of the own study to motivate follow-up studies