You have to answer a question : now what do you do? (research design) -- Muck around in the numbers! (descriptive statistics) -- Bring some order to this chaos! (more descriptive statistics) -- The picture is becoming clearer (yet more descriptive statistics) -- How much is not much? (probability) -- That picture doesn't look a thing like me! (samples versus populations) -- The poll numbers are in, and in the lead is-- (taking a sample) -- Can we please start to actually conclude something? (drawing conclusions with nominal or ordinal data) -- Ok, folks, what is causing the problem here? (drawing conclusions with interval data). "...Demonstrate[s] how statistics can help you do your job better. The goal of this book is to make you, as a public administrator, an educated consumer and effective translator of statistical information. You'll be able to understand the general approaches and problems with public sector research and data measurement, conduct basic statistical analyses of raw data using a variety of methods, and evaluate the validity of statistical research performed by others." --From back cover.