Most health professionals are resistant to statistics. There is nothing inconsistent about it: if they liked Mathematics as a profession, they would have chosen a career in the exact sciences. Clinical dentists are not different: most of them prefer to avoid greater proximity to, and as a consequence , understanding of statistics. Undoubtedly, many statistical procedures involve complex and dif...

This chapter discusses several topics, from why statistics is important in anthropological research to statistical notation. The first section (statistics and scientific enquiry) defines basic scientific terms and explains the role of statistics in anthropological research. The second section (basic definitions) reviews the vocabulary we need for the rest of the book. The third section (statist...