Table of contents

The course is connected to the following study programs

Teaching language

Norwegian/English 

Learning outcomes

After completing the course, the students will 

  • have a good understanding of study design
  • have advanced skills in statistical programming in the R language
  • have advanced skills in data wrangling and graphical data exploration techniques
  • have advanced skills in linear models and their extensions
  • have advanced skills in different types of model selection
  • be able to apply the acquired methods and techniques to their own data
  • be able to critically evaluate and improve other people’s code

Contents

This course will introduce the students to working with real-life data common and statistical methods used in evolution and ecology. The course focuses on developing robust and repeatable workflows for data wrangling, data visualisation and statistical analysis. The students will get an introduction to basic linear models, mode selection and more advanced methods such as Generalised Linear Models and Mixed Models. Throughout the course students will use the programming language R, the RStudio package, and Git. The students will organize and supervise an R coding club throughout the duration of the course.

Teaching and learning methods

Classes will be a mixture of lectures, practical exercises, and self-study, designed to build required skills for future modules and to perform analyses frequently encountered in the biological literature. Instruction will be given in English. More information will be given in Canvas at the start of the course.

The estimated student workload in this course is 135 hours.

Examination requirements

Approval of reports from all compulsory learning activities. Details are given in Canvas by the start of the course.

Examinations

Portfolio including 1) three coding and statistics challenges related to the course contents and 2) an individually written report including data analysis and interpretation of a given data set. Graded pass/fail. More information will be given in Canvas at the start of the course.

Student evaluation

Emneansvarlig fastsetter i samråd med studenttillitsvalgt evalueringsform og om emnene skal ha midtveis- eller sluttevaluering i tråd med kvalitetssystemet kapittel 4.1. Informasjon om evalueringsform for emnet publiseres i Canvas.

Reduction of Credits

This course’s contents overlap with the following courses. A reduction of credits will occur if one of these courses is taken in addition:

Course Reduction of Credits
BIO403 – Statistics in Ecological Studies. 5
Last updated from FS (Felles studentsystem) Oct. 15, 2026 9:15:45 AM