It is not the time it takes the computer to execute the commands that is important but rather the time it takes the statistician to develop new software. Ongoing research and software development in the Statistics Department is building computing environments that increase the effectiveness and efficiency of the statistician. There is associated research on statistical graphics, on developing software to implement specific new statistical methods and on computer-intensive statistical methods such as Markov Chain Monte Carlo. The analysis of survey data Over the years, researchers have been analysing data from complex surveys as if it came from random samples. The results of such analyses can be extremely misleading.
Standard methods have to be adapted to allow for the special features of survey data.
Alastair Scott has been a world authority in this area for many years. Research is also being done into novel ways of obtaining and analysing market research data, multilevel modelling, the effects of interviewer variability on subsequent analyses, and the design of panel studies. Statistical ecology and the sampling of biological populations Auckland is known for its research into the estimation of animal numbers. George Seber is a world authority and the author of the standard textbook on the subject. The way that animal and fish populations cluster make for special sampling problems and allow for novel approaches.