A Career in Statistics: Beyond the Numbers

CHAPTER 4

WHAT STATISTICIANS DO: SOME OTHER APPLICATION AREAS

4.1 ABOUT THIS CHAPTER

In this chapter, we consider some added application areas in which statisticians are engaged: regulatory activities, health, national defense, other scientific research, social and behavioral sciences, and teaching (in nonacademic settings). We conclude with a brief description of some further institutes that conduct various types of research in the United States.

Some of the statisticians involved in these areas are government employees. But their work is often quite different from that of government statisticians who are principally involved in gathering, analyzing, and reporting official statistics, as described in Chapter 3. They are also more likely to hold Ph.D. degrees than their counterparts involved in official statistics.1

The application of statistics, together with other quantitative approaches in some of these and other areas, has given rise to a new nomenclature of professional fields, such as biostatistics, chemometrics, econometrics, and psychometrics.2

4.2 REGULATORY ACTIVITIES

Numerous government agencies are engaged in a variety of regulatory activities. In the United States, these include the Food and Drug Administration, the Environmental Protection Agency, the Federal Communications Commission, and the Consumer Product Safety Commission. Their work includes helping

• Establish laws and regulations to protect, for example, the general public (or particular segments) or the environment. ...