Data Analysis in R

Students should apply for Data analysis in R to discover the enormous potential of the open-source programming language R and to develop a series of skills and tools to analyse statistical problems of a diverse nature.
Almost every major organizations and universities use R. Google not only uses R but has also written standards for the language that are widely accepted.

This course focuses upon understanding statistical models and analysing the results whilst learning to work with R. As well as introducing the software to newcomers, it presents basic and more advanced statistics.

We will start with descriptive statistics and visual representation of data, which is the first step for most statistical analyses. We then introduce the linear regression model, a widely used model with two main purposes: modelling relationships among the data and predicting future observations. After that, we will extend the linear model to the generalised linear framework, in order to analyse non-normally distributed variables.

Each day consists of short lectures with examples and exercises in which you apply what you have learned right away. At the end of the course there will be a written assignment which will be graded.

Course leader

Andrea Bassi

Target group

Final year Bachelor's, Master’s students, PhD candidates, and professionals who are interested in learning the basics and some more advanced skills of R and applying them to solve their data analysis problems are welcome to apply. A basic knowledge of statistics (at least an undergraduate course) is a prerequisite to apply.

If you have doubts about your eligibility for the course, please contact us via graduatewinterschool@vu.nl

Course aim

By the end of the course, students will be acquainted with various popular R packages, and will be able to perform different statistical analyses, writing their own functions and use attractive plots to present their data.