A historical overview of textbook presentations of statistical science

Alan Agresti

Scandinavian Journal of Statistics, 2023, vol. 50, issue 4, 1641-1666

Abstract: We discuss the evolution in the presentation of statistical science in English‐language textbooks, focusing on the period 1900–1970 as the field became increasingly influenced by research contributions of R. A. Fisher and Jerzy Neyman. George Udny Yule authored an early popular book that had 14 editions. Methods books authored by Fisher and George Snedecor guided scientists in implementing modern statistical methods. In the World War 2 era, textbooks authored by Maurice Kendall, Samuel Wilks, and Harald Cramér presented a dramatically different “mathematical statistics” portrayal that centered on theoretical foundations. The textbook emergence of the Bayesian approach occurred later, influenced by books by Harold Jeffreys and Leonard J. Savage. The quarter century after World War 2 saw an explosion of books in mathematical statistics and in particular topic areas. In addition to his highly cited research contributions, Sir David Cox was a prolific author of books on a great variety of topics. Most were published after the 1900–1970 period considered in this article, but we also summarize them as part of this special issue to honor his memory. We conclude by discussing the future of textbooks on the foundations of statistical science in the emerging, ever‐broader, era of data science.

Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/sjos.12641

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:scjsta:v:50:y:2023:i:4:p:1641-1666

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.blackwell ... bs.asp?ref=0303-6898

Access Statistics for this article

Scandinavian Journal of Statistics is currently edited by ÿrnulf Borgan and Bo Lindqvist

More articles in Scandinavian Journal of Statistics from Danish Society for Theoretical Statistics, Finnish Statistical Society, Norwegian Statistical Association, Swedish Statistical Association
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().