The use of statistical methods in library and information science

Danny P. Wallace

Journal of the American Society for Information Science, 1985, vol. 36, issue 6, 402-410

Abstract: This study compared the use of statistics in 99 journals from four subject areas: library and information science, education, social work, and business. It was found that journals in library and information science produced more articles making no use of statistics than did journals in the other three subject areas, and that only in library and information science were there more articles using descriptive techniques only than articles using inferential techniques. A comparison of the mean number of articles per journal using no statistics, descriptive statistics only, and inferential statistics indicated that the mean number of articles per journal using inferential statistics was much lower for library and information science than for the other subject areas. The only inferential technique not used significantly less in library and information science than in the other subject areas was correlation, one of the simplest of inferential techniques.

Date: 1985
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