While descriptive statistics describes the characteristics of a single variable, inferential statistics examines the relationship between two or more variables. Bivariate statistics is a type of inferential statistics that deals with the relationship between two variables. That is, bivariate statistics examines how one variable compares with another or how one variable influences another variable.

This entry explains bivariate statistics by giving concrete examples from communication research. This entry also elaborates on two different types of bivariate statistics (i.e., correlation and t-test). Finally, this entry outlines the procedures for conducting a bivariate analysis.