Welcome to STAT 362

Introduction to Computer Statistical Packages

Fall, 1999

If you send email to the instructor, please put "Stat 362" in the subject line.

This course is an introduction to the use of statistical software packages in data analysis. The main package to be used will be SAS.

The statistical topics covered include basic univariate descriptive statistics, methods of inference for univariate statistics, and regression analysis.

Data manipulation with SAS and other software packages will be addressed.

The texts are SAS manuals.

PostScript versions of some of the lectures, ASCII files of data, and other files will be available online.

The class meets MWF 2:30-3:20.

There will be weekly assignments.
Performance on the assignments will constitute 10\% of the total grade in the course.

There will be three quizzes, in addition to the exam.
Performance on the quizzes will constitute 60\% of the total grade in the course.

The final exam is December 17 at 1:30.
Performance on the exam will constitute 30\% of the total grade in the course.

An approximate schedule is shown below. As the semester progresses, more details will be provided on the topics to be covered.

Week 1, Aug 30
Computer systems and organization; applications software.
Data organization for statistical analysis.
Introduction to the SAS software system
DATA step, PROC PRINT, and PROC CHART
Week 2, Sep 6
Basic univariate statistics.
Review of basic statistics: estimation, hypothesis testing; etc.
The SAS DATA step and more PROCs (and Assignment 1)
Conditional execution.
PROC MEANS, PROC UNIVARIATE, PROC SUMMARY, PROC TABULATE, and PROC CORR
Week 3, Sep 13
Methods of data input; saving and reusing SAS datasets.
Additional statements in the SAS DATA step (and Assignment 2)
Functions, OUTPUT/DELETE, DROP/KEEP, RENAME, LABEL
Week 4, Sep 20
Combining and manipulating SAS datasets (and Assignment 3)
Sorting, concatenation, interleaving, merging, updating.
Friday, September 24, Quiz 1.
Week 5, Sep 27
Review of Quiz 1
More on combining and manipulating SAS datasets; lagged variables; automatic variables; arrays; DO loops; and labels (and Assignment 4)
Week 6, Oct 4
Regression analysis.
Regression in SAS
More on the INPUT statement and controlling output (and Assignment 5)
Character data; PUT and FILE statements;
PROC FORMAT; custom formats; recoding.
Week 7, Oct 11
More on regression analysis:
inspection of residuals -- patterns; polynomial regression; confidence intervals; prediction intervals.
Week 8, Oct 18
Regression analysis; fitting; the AOV table associated with a regression analysis; adequacy of fit: R-squared, adjusted R-squared
Week 9, Oct 25
Regression model building; selection of variables in regression.
PROC CONTENT, PROC DATASETS
Assignment 6
Friday, October 29, Quiz 2.
Week 10, Nov 1
Review of Quiz 2
More on regression: Regression graphics.
SAS macros, and Part I of Assignment 7
Week 11, Nov 8
Date data.
Options in SAS.
Data informats/formats, and Part II of Assignment 7.
Importing and exporting data. Assignment 8.
Week 12, Nov 15
More on SAS data manipulation. Assignment 9.
Week 13, Nov 22
Statistical graphics.
SAS/GRAPH. Assignment 10.
Week 14, Nov 29
More on SAS/GRAPH.
Friday, December 3, Quiz 3.
Week 15, Dec 6
Other SAS features.
PROC IML.
Review.

Exam December 12, 1:30 - 4:15