Historical development

The development of new statistical methods stems directly or indirectly from specific applications or groups of related applications. It is part of the role of statistical theory in the broad sense not only to develop new concepts and procedures but also to consolidate new developments, often developed in an ad hoc way, into a coherent framework. While many fields of study have been involved, at certain times specific subjects have been particularly influential. Thus in the period 1920–1939 there was a strong emphasis on agricultural research; from 1945 problems from the process industries drove many statistical developments; from 1970 onwards much statistical motivation has arisen out of medical statistics and epidemiology. Recently genetics, particle physics and astrophysics have raised major issues. Throughout this time social statistics, which gave the subject its name, have remained a source of challenge.

Clearly a major force in current developments is the spectacular growth in computing power in analysis, in data storage and capture and in highly sophisticated measurement procedures. The availability of data too extensive to analyse is, however, by no means a new phenomenon. Fifty or more years ago the extensive data recorded on paper tapes could scarcely be analysed numerically, although the now-defunct skill of analogue computation could occasionally be deployed.