Educational Research: The Ethics and Aesthetics of Statistics (Hardcover)

1. Introduction.- 2. The lure of statistics for educational researchers.- 3. Dazzling statistics? On the university expansion in Flanders and the need for research into the history of education that transcends quantifying sociology.- 4. Child maltreatment in the last fifty years: The use of statistics.- 5. Constructing social unity and presenting clear predictions: The promise of public opinion pollsters to measure and to educate society.- 6. The science and art of the single case in educational research.- 7. To frame the unframable: Quantifying irregular migrants' presence.- 8. European citizenship and evidence-based happiness.- 9. The persuasive power of figures and the aesthetics of the dirty backyards of statistics in educational research.- 10. The good, the beautiful and the literate: Making statistics accessible for action.- 11. Statistics and the interference to the best explanation. Living without complexity?.- 12. Performativity, statistics and bloody words.- 13. A bubble for the spirit-level: Metricophilia, rhetoric and philosophy.- 14. Calling education to account.- Notes on Contributors.- Index.