Why is this important?
Statistics is one of the main tools used, for better or worse, to influence human decisions. I'm sure we've all been swayed by advertisements claiming that some number of users see 'positive results', or by articles citing specific values as evidence to support particular beliefs.
Since furthering my understanding of statistics, I’ve been shocked to discover the amount of misinformation that is propagated through the media solely due to the misinterpretation of data. This was incredibly evident during the 2020 - 2023 COVID crisis, when bad-faith representations of statistics resulted in a catastrophic movement against vaccination and masking.
How can I improve my understanding of statistics?
My journey into statistics started from privilege, as a student at University. For those of you in the same position, I'd recommend anything with Andrew Gelman in the author list. However there are also a miriad of options for those of you starting from scratch -- one example I've seen mentioned on a number of forums is Head first statistics by Dawn Griffiths.