Back to Global Statistics - Composite Indices for International Comparisons
University of Geneva

Global Statistics - Composite Indices for International Comparisons

The number of composite indices that are constructed and used internationally is growing very fast; but whilst the complexity of quantitative techniques has increased dramatically, the education and training in this area has been dragging and lagging behind. As a consequence, these simple numbers, expected to synthesize quite complex issues, are often presented to the public and used in the political debate without proper emphasis on their intrinsic limitations and correct interpretations. In this course on global statistics, offered by the University of Geneva jointly with the ETH Zürich KOF, you will learn the general approach of constructing composite indices and some of resulting problems. We will discuss the technical properties, the internal structure (like aggregation, weighting, stability of time series), the primary data used and the variable selection methods. These concepts will be illustrated using a sample of the most popular composite indices. We will try to address not only statistical questions but also focus on the distinction between policy-, media- and paradigm-driven indicators.

Status: Social Studies
Status: Market Opportunities
IntermediateCourse16 hours

Featured reviews

Reviewed Mar 29, 2019

Eventhough this isn't something I want to particularly do in the future I would like to say that I have enjoyed learning about composite indicators. I would highly recommend this MOOC to anyone.

Reviewed Feb 2, 2026

This course was improved my understanding of composite indices and the various methodologies used to develop them.

Reviewed Jun 15, 2020

It is a good platform to study about complex indices in statistics.I really enjoyed this.

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