Statistical Methods

Software and dataset tips:

R can be obtained and installed from www.r-project.org/. That site has many pointers for using R, and programming in it.

A nicely packaged version of R can also be obtained from www.rstudio.org.

The University has a campus license as well as student license for Stata, which is a very friendly and powerful software. If you don't have experience with any statistical software, I'd recommend starting with Stata.

A variety of statistical exercises and examples in R, SPSS, and Stata can be found at the Academic Technology Services website at UCLA: http://www.ats.ucla.edu/stat/

The list of resources specifically for learning and using R is at: http://www.ats.ucla.edu/stat/r/

There are also numerous R books and tutorials, for example:

R in Action by R. Kabacoff
Quick-R site by the R. Kabacoff, based on the "R in Action" book
Data Analysis and Graphics Using R by J. Maindonald
simpleR, by J.Verzani
R Tutorial by C. Yau

A collection of many statistical datasets, from a variety of books and websites, can be found at: http://www.statsci.org/datasets.html