Help understanding statistics

[litchi]

I just started my summer Scholarly Inquiry class where we read lots and lots of nursing research. After picking up my book and reading my first assigned article, I've quickly come to the conclusion that I probably shouldn't have brain dumped everything I learned in my statistics class. I'm having a hard time understanding everything. I get the overall gist of things from reading the abstracts and conclusion. When it comes to answering the more number oriented questions though, I'm still struggling a bit. I'm not looking for answers exactly, just guidance.

I'm having problems with three questions in particular:

1) The researcher characterizes the r of -.33 as "moderate." Do you agree with this characterization?

2) For the r of -.50, the researcher indicates that "p

3') The researcher reports the values of six correlation coefficients: (r = -.33, p

For the first question, I'm assuming that the further the number is away from 0 the stronger it is. The problem is, I'm not sure about the range. Is it 0 to -1? If so, -.33 still seems small to me. However, later on in the study the r of -.50 is said to be considered strong. Given that, I'd agree that -.33 would be moderate. Is that right? I'm not really sure.

For the second question, I'm pretty sure that p is probability. The .01 is the percentage. So there's less than a 1% chance to have.. wait, what? I think my brain was on the right track, then it just got tired or something. I'm getting confused again.

For the third question, I would think that the (r = -.5, p

I've been googling my little heart out trying to figure this stuff out, but I'm still getting lost and a little frustrated with it. It doesn't help that I'm going to be tested over it tomorrow. I actually think I'll do ok, but I'd still like to actually understand what all these numbers mean. I've got a LOT more articles to read over the next 5 weeks after all. If anybody could help steer me in the right direction, I would really appreciate it.

[ICUchick]

I can't help you with your question but I can tell you that you just motivated me to pay a LOT more attention in stats class!

[TnRN43]

I remember a little, lol. I know that for #1, 1 and -1 are considered 'perfect', so I think -.33 would be half way between 0 and -1, so moderate would be a good description. I'm not really sure about the other 2.

[litchi]

I can't help you with your question but I can tell you that you just motivated me to pay a LOT more attention in stats class!

Yep. It was one of those things that I didn't think I'd really use ever again. I kinda wondered why I even needed to take a stats class for nursing to begin with.. well, now I know why!

[Boog'sCRRN246, RN]

This might be too late, but maybe it will help at some point. My statistics instructor posted this link for us at the beginning of the semester:

http://stattrek.com/AP-Statistics-2/Experimental-Design.aspx?Tutorial=AP

[amandakash]

p is the probability of obtaining a statistic assuming that the null hypothesis is true, but not the probability of the null hypothesis being true. That always confused me.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P-value

I'll try to find my stat notes from last summer and post more if you need it. Looks like I need to dig them out anyway for the fall .

[LadyinScrubs, ASN, RN]

I have had more statistic classes than I want to remember and in two different areas of study. It has been some time since I took nursing research/nursing statistics, but don't you have a book that corresponds to what you are studying. If not, get one--if only for reference.