Publications
These are some of the SSC's publications dealing with how to use statistics to solve day-to-day problems. They are organised under the following themes:
- Writing research protocols
- Statistical Guidelines for researchers
- Help on data management
- Guides on using Excel for statistics
- Analysis of Designed Experiments
- Climate Variability and Climate Change
- Integrating qualitative and quantitative research traditions
- An Evaluation of development initiatives
- Survey methods
- Teaching Statistics
- About the SSC and its work
Writing research protocols
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Writing Research Protocols - a statistical perspective
English version
Version en Español
Statistical Guidelines for researchers
A series of short documents covering a series of topics, originally written as part of a contract with the UK Government's Department for International Development (DFID) as guidance for research and support staff working on DFID Natural Resources Projects. Rewritten and published in 2004 as a book.
Some of the guides have been translated to Spanish and/or French.
Help on data management
The first two guides below were produced by the SSC for the DFID funded Research Into Use (RIU) programme managed by Natural Resources International Limited. The third item is a document containing the training materials for a course on Research Data Management.
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Research Data Management - a training course organised by the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF).
Guides on using Excel for statistics
Analysis of Designed Experiments
A complete set of training notes for a course on the analysis of experimental data. The notes were produced in collaboration with the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF), part supported by DFID. Earlier versions were used on training courses in Tanzania, Kenya, Benin and Guinea.
- Part 1: Workshop Overview & Session Summaries
- Part 2: Lecture Notes
- Part 3: Exercise Guidelines
- Part 4: Experiments Portfolio
Climatic Variability and Climate Change
The following guide has been developed for those wishing to use GenStat for the analysis of climate data. The guide was originally written for version 7 (Genstat Discovery edition) and was later updated for version 11. Both versions are available here together with the datasets used which can be downloaded as a zip file.
Integrating qualitative and quantitative research traditions
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Integrating Qualitative and Quantitative Approaches - a methological framework for combining qualitative and quantitative methods in socio-economic survey work. All the outputs of a DFID-funded collaborative project with the Social and Economic Development Department, Natural Resources Institute.
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How to Generate Statistics and Influence Policy Using Participatory Methods in Research: Reflections on Work in Malawi 1999-2002 (IDS Working Papers 212). Link to IDS site.
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Integrating Qualitative Dimensions of Poverty into the third Uganda National Household Survey. African Statistics Journal Vol 8. Link to ASJ site.
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Quantitative Analysis Approaches to Qualitative Data (Savitri Abeyasekera)
An Evaluation of development initiatives
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Randomised Control Trials for the Impact Evaluation of Development Initiatives: A Statistician's Point of View. ILAC Working Paper 13 - direct link to paper on ILAC site. ILAC Working Papers -link to ILAC site.
Survey methods
- Chapters from a publication (currently in press) of the Statistics Division, UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs: Household Surveys in Developing and Transition Countries: Design, Implementation and Analysis ...
- Chapter 18: Multivariate
methods for index construction (S.Abeyasekera)
Chapter 19: Statistical analysis of survey data (J.Chromy & S.Abeyasekera)
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Some Practical Sampling Procedures for Development Research (Ian Wilson)
Teaching Statistics
The following publications were papers presented at various conferences. The first 3 are from ICOTS8 (International Conference on Teaching Statistics 2010).
- E-Learning of Statistics in Africa
- The use of computer-based tests to consolidate statistical concepts in Kenya
- The
growing role of computers for teaching statistics in Kenya
- Improving the learning of statistics with computer-based exercises
- Statistical games to support problem-based learning
- Facilitated e-learning in Sub-Saharan Africa
About the SSC and its work
Last updated: 2 February, 2012

