Statistical Analysis in Simple Steps Using R

Prof Kiran Pandya obtained MPhil degree from the University of Poona, for which he studied at Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics. He also holds first class master's degree in economics from the M S University of Baroda. He was awarded a PhD by the University of Sussex (UK). The Commonwealth Commission in UK awarded him the Academic Staff scholarship to pursue his doctoral studies. Currently, he is working as a professor and head of the Department of Human Resource Development, Veer Narmad South Gujarat University, Surat (Gujarat, India). He has more than 35 years of teaching and research experience. He held several important administrative positions in the University.Dr Pandya came back from England in 1993 with an objective to do something for the academic fraternity and for the cause of education. He believed in succession planning and in the past decade and a half, he has trained around 3 generations of students in economics, statistics, econometrics and research methodology. He regularly organized training programmes and workshops in these areas. Research scholars and faculty members from across the region and country participate in these workshops. He is proficient in the use of SPSS, Gretl, R, Minitab and many other statistical softwares. Recently he has revived his interest in Philosophy of Research.

Dr Pandya has worked on many research projects funded by the Government, ICSSR and corporates. Two of his major research works were preparation of the District Human Development Reports of Surat and Tapi districts of Gujarat (India). The reports were to be prepared on behalf of the Government to give them an insight into decentralized planning with an objective to foster development of the districts. He is carrying out ICSSR-sponsored research project as Principal Co-ordinator. Prof Pandya has published number of papers in reputed national and international journals. He is also on the editorial board of few journals. Dr Pandya has co-authored a book on Statistical Analysis using SPSS with Dr Smruti Bulsari. He has also co-authored books in Gujarati, the regional language of Gujarat (India) in area of Quantitative Methods and SPSS.

Dr Prashant Joshi is presently working as Professor and Head, Department of Management, Uka Tarsadia University, Gujarat (India). He is also the Dean, Faculty of Commerce and Management in his University. He studied Big Data and Analytics course at the University of Essex. He worked as a faculty member at Department of International Finance, I-Shou University, Taiwan, where he received Best Professor Appreciation Award. He also worked as a visiting professor at Cape Breton University, Canada. He has also made academic visits to Germany, France, Switzerland, Brussels and Luxemburg. He has more than 19 years of experience in industry, teaching and research. Dr Joshi teaches courses on statistics and econometrics time series analysis, research methodology, investment analysis and portfolio management in India and abroad. He is proficient in use of RATS, EViews, SPSS, SAS, R, Python, G@RCH, Tableau and STATA.

Dr Joshi successfully completed a course offered by IMF on Macroeconometric Forecasting. Besides, he has also completed a course on Python for Finance: Investment Fundamentals and Data Analytics by Udemi. He has an exposure in handling Volatility Modelling, VAR, Bayesian Analysis and Regime Switching using RATS. Dr Joshi has published 5 international books in the subject of data analysis, financial econometrics and statistics and written more than 48 research papers in the national and international journals. His research paper on behavioral biases in IPO market won Best Research Paper award in a national conference. He has undertaken useful minor and major research projects. One of his projects was funded by the National Stock Exchange of India to study Market Integration and Efficiency of Indian Stock Markets: A Study of NSE. He has delivered lectures in refresher courses, training programmes, national and international level workshops with participants from India and abroad. He has been associated with Entrepreneurship Development Institute of India for the last 7 years and delivering special lectures on Financial Analytics and Econometrics in the training programme organized under the International Technical and Economic Co-operation by the Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India. Besides, he has organized a number of training programmes, workshops, national-level conference, and seminars. Apart from academics, he enjoys travelling and playing various sports. Dr Smruti Bulsari is currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Human Resource Development, Veer Narmad South Gujarat University. She is the convener of the HR Analytics Cell of the Department. She holds a doctorate in economics and two master degrees in management and economics. Presently, she is pursuing her third master degree in data science from the Department of Mathematical Sciences, University of Essex (UK). She has been awarded the Academic Excellence Scholarship of the University of Essex to pursue this master degree. She strengthened her understanding and developed skills in data science and big data analytics by attending a training programme at the London School of Economics and Political Sciences. Dr Bulsari holds a post-graduate diploma in research methodology and a diploma in computer engineering. She teaches modules on survey research, qualitative research, statistical analysis, microeconomics at undergraduate, graduate and PhD course work. She is proficient in the use of SPSS, Gretl, R and Python required for statistical analysis and big data. She is also well versed with programming languages like Java, C/C++ and DBMS software. Exploring new subject areas and undertaking interdisciplinary studies are her passion.

She delivers lectures in various national and international training programmes in quantitative techniques and data analysis. Dr Bulsari has given invited talks on misuses of statistics and Indian economy at the Mahidol University, Thailand. She is regularly invited by the Entrepreneurship Development Institute (EDI) of India to deliver special lectures in multivariate analysis and panel data analysis using software in the training programme organized under the International Technical and Economic Co-operation by the Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India. She is associated with EDI for past 9 years for this programme.

Dr Bulsari is a long-time co-coordinator to the research projects and co-author to various research papers and books with Dr Pandya. Her area of interest in research is gender sensitivity and empowerment, though she has worked in the areas of health and livelihood as well. She also gives public talks on gender sensitivity and empowerment, though she has also given talks on other topics of her interest. She is proficient in the use of qualitative research methods.