Purpose of this Guide
The information in these pages will help you:
- find statistics in library databases
- find articles in scholarly journals with results of statistical studies and experiments
- find reference sources to define and explain concepts in your textbook
- Contact librarians for research assistance.
Resources for this Course
YaRrr! The Pirate's Guide to R by Nathaniel D. Phillips
- An introduction to the basic analytical tools in R, from basic coding and analyses, to data wrangling, plotting, and statistical inference.
An Introduction to Political and Social Analysis Using R by Thomas M. Holbrook
- This book provides students with a comprehensive and accessible overview of important issues related to political and social data analysis, wile also providing a gentle introduction to using the R programming environment to address those issues.
R Workflow article by Frank E. Harrell, Jr.
- Covers how to use R effectively all the way from importing data to analysis and making use of RStudio's Quarto for making reproducible reports with R and other language. This article also provides an overview of R Workflow for Reproducible Data Analysis and Reporting by the same author, which contains best practices in reproducible data documentation and manipulation, statistical analysis, graphics, and reporting.
R Tutorials and Resources: Getting Started with R
- This page has links to other webpages with tutorials on learning how to use R. There are also links to other topics related to R.
How to Install R and RStudio
R is a language and software environment for statistical computing and graphics. It provides a wide variety of statistical and graphical techniques. R is available as a free software, which runs on Linux, MacOS and Windown. You can download R from the Comprehensive R Archive Network (CRAN), part of The R Project for Statistical Computing.
RStudio is an integrated development environment (IDE) for R and Python. It includes a console, syntax-highlighting editor that supports direct code execution, and tools for plotting, history, debugging, and workspace management. It is available as an open source edition and runs in Windows, MacOS, and Linus environments. You can download RStudio from the POSIT website.
This helpful YouTube video talking you through downloading R and RStudio:
- How to Download and Install R and R Studio (about 5 minutes)
Installing R on Your Machine has step-by-step instructions on how to install R and RStudio Desktop on Windows and MacOS. It also has instructions for installing R Kernel on Jupyter Notebook for both Windows and MacOS.
Once you've installed RStudio, Descriptive Statistics and an Overview of RStudio (about 6 minutes) will get help get you started using RStudio
Statistics Video Tutorials
The Against All Odds: Inside Statistics videos from Films on Demand provide an overview on the art and science of gathering, organizing, analyzing and drawing conclusions from data.
Databases with Statistical Content
The following library resources will provide access to statistical summaries, as well as datasets.
- Cross-National Time Series Data Archive This link opens in a new windowA data set comprised of more than 200 years of annual political, legislative, and economic data from 1815 onward for over 200 countries. Over two million data points, from 196 variables, in easy to use Excel format.
- Historical Statistics of the United States This link opens in a new windowA compendium of statistics from over 37,000 data series -- three times more than in the previous edition -- and dozens of new topics, among them slavery, American Indians, and poverty. Other topics include migration, health, crime, the Confederate States of America, population demographics, religion, business, and education. There are also many essays by recognized experts to put the topics in context.
- ICPSR This link opens in a new windowA searchable archive of social science data from the Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research (ICPSR), an international consortium of over 750 research universities working together to acquire and preserve social science data, to provide open and equitable access to these data, and to promote effect data use.
In addition to archiving collections from such disciplines as sociology, economics, political science, and history, ICPSR also has a number of special emphases: gerontology, substance abuse and mental health, criminal justice, child care, health and medical care, and demography.
The data can be downloaded and analyzed in multiple software formats including SPSS, SAS, Stata, and R. - OECD iLibrary This link opens in a new windowJournals, books, and statistics from the Organization for Economic Development (OECD). Special emphasis on international economics, development and health; country economics, and agriculture. More than 45 different statistical databases, with internationational coverage.
- RAND State Statistics This link opens in a new window
Our subscription to RAND State Statistics ends December 9, 2022.
For alternative sources, please consult our Finding Statistics and Data subject guide or contact us with questions.
More than 110 databases of statistics information--much of it available at the national, state, county, and city levels--in the categories of business and economics, community, education, energy and environment, government finance, health and socioeconomic, and population and demographics.
Ask A Librarian
Having trouble? Ask!
- Use our 24/7 Live Chat located on the bottom right of library websites.
- Call (806) 651-2215 during library hours
- Use "Email a Librarian" to ask a question. Most responses within 1 business day.
- Stop by the first floor Research & Access Desk anytime the library is open