Statistical Consulting Services for Researchers

Statistical consulting is expert advisory and hands-on guidance from a PhD statistician who confirms your design fits the question, runs the right analysis in R, Stata, SPSS, or SAS, and interprets results so they survive peer review. Research Gold works one-off or ongoing, from a design-stage plan to a second opinion before submission, and returns reproducible code with a written interpretation you can defend.

R, Stata, SPSS, SASPhD MethodologistsDesign, analysis, interpretation

Short answer

Statistical consulting is expert advisory and hands-on guidance from a PhD statistician who confirms your design fits the question, runs the right analysis in R, Stata, SPSS, or SAS, and interprets results so they survive peer review. Research Gold works one-off or ongoing, from a design-stage plan to a second opinion before submission, and returns reproducible code with a written interpretation you can defend.

Free written quote

Scope, timeline, and price before you commit

Quote in minutes

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R, Stata, SPSS, SAS

Reproducible code at handoff

PhD methodologists

Design, analysis, and interpretation

Need a statistician to design, run, or check your analysis? A PhD methodologist will recommend the right approach and deliver reproducible results. Get a free quote.

A statistician on call, from first design to final submission

Not every research problem calls for a full done-for-you analysis. Sometimes what you need is someone to confirm the design before you collect a single data point, to sanity-check a model a reviewer is now questioning, or to stay alongside a project for months as the analysis evolves and new questions surface. That advisory relationship, rather than one transactional deliverable, is what statistical consulting is built for, and it is where a statistics consultant who has actually published in your field is worth far more than a generic hour of help. You keep ownership of the project; we make sure every methodological decision inside it is defensible.

Research Gold delivers statistical consulting services led by PhD methodologists with experience across health sciences, nursing, psychology, education, social sciences, and beyond. Depending on the stage of your project, you are matched with a PhD statistician who has published in your field, and for clinical and trial datasets that reaches into medical statistics consulting. For hands-on work rather than advisory sessions, you can hire a statistician for hands-on analysis. You bring the research question and the data. We recommend the right approach, run the analysis in R, Stata, SPSS, or SAS, and return reproducible code with a written interpretation you can stand behind.

What our statistical consulting includes

A full statistical consulting engagement spans study design and analysis planning, sample size and power, model selection, assumption checks, regression and mixed models, and results interpretation and reporting, in R, Stata, SPSS, or SAS, and is available for one-off or ongoing consultation. It covers the entire analytical lifecycle, or any single stage of it:

  • Study design and analysis-plan advice, so the data you collect can actually answer your question.
  • Statistical test selection matched to your hypotheses, variables, and design.
  • Data cleaning and screening, including missing-data strategy and assumption checks.
  • The analysis itself, run in your required software with annotated, reproducible code.
  • Tables, figures, and a results-section draft in your target style.
  • A written interpretation of every result, so you can explain the analysis in your own words.

You can engage us for the full pipeline or for a single piece: a statistical interpretation service for results you already have, a second opinion on a method choice, or a one-off data analysis consulting review before submission.

When to hire a statistical consultant

Most researchers reach for a statistical consultant at one of three moments: at the design stage, before data collection where possible, when the wrong choice now means uninterpretable data later; mid-project, when the analysis grows beyond what a spreadsheet or a single calculator can handle; or after a reviewer asks for an analysis their training never covered. Any of these is the right time. Early advice is cheaper than a redesign, and a defensible analysis is cheaper than a rejection.

If you want to test the waters first, our free tools handle the routine work: a regression calculator, a sample size calculator, and a statistical power calculator. When the question outgrows the tool, that is exactly when a research statistics consultant earns the fee.

How this differs from our other statistics services

Statistical consulting is the general hub for researchers across every field. Three neighbouring services are more specialised:

If you are unsure which of your problems is methodological rather than purely statistical, our research consultant service advises on the broader design and strategy.

Ready to start? A PhD methodologist will quote your project in minutes.

Free re-run and re-write if reviewers question the analysis or reporting.

Software and methods we cover

We use whichever software your field, journal, or institution expects, and deliver the code so the analysis is reproducible:

SoftwareCommon consulting use
RMixed-effects models, structural equation modelling, advanced regression, reproducible reports
StataPanel data, survey-weighted estimation, survival analysis, econometrics
SPSSAnalysis of variance, regression, reliability, PROCESS macro mediation
SASLarge datasets and regulated analyses

Method coverage spans regression (linear, logistic, Poisson), analysis of variance and its repeated-measures and multivariate variants, survival analysis, mixed-effects and multilevel models, factor analysis and structural equation modelling, and propensity score methods for observational data.

Advisory sessions or a full second-opinion review

Engagements here are deliberately flexible. Some clients book a single advisory session to pressure-test a design or an analysis plan; others hand over their output for a second-opinion review before submission, where we re-run the models, document every assumption check, and flag anything a reviewer would catch. Wherever a written record is useful, statistics are reported to the SAMPL guidelines for statistical reporting (Lang and Altman, 2015) and, where applicable, STROBE for observational studies (von Elm et al., 2007) or CONSORT for randomized trials (Schulz et al., BMJ, 2010). Every recommendation comes with a written rationale you can put in front of a supervisor or reviewer, and any reviewer-requested re-analysis is handled within the original scope.

Who we work with

  • Researchers and faculty who need a defensible analysis but no in-house statistician
  • Research teams that want a second statistician to review the analysis before submission
  • Grant applicants who need an analysis plan and sample-size justification
  • Authors responding to reviewers who asked for an analysis outside the team's training
  • Industry and policy researchers who need quantitative conclusions that hold up to scrutiny

What you receive

  • A written analysis plan with the test-selection rationale
  • Annotated R, Stata, SPSS, or SAS code so the analysis is fully reproducible
  • A cleaned dataset with a variable codebook
  • Publication or report-ready tables and figures
  • A results-section draft in your target style, formatted to the APA Publication Manual, 7th edition (American Psychological Association, 2020) where your journal uses it
  • A written interpretation of every result

Get a statistical consulting quote

You can review our published sample analyses and deliverables to see the standard of reporting before you commit, and if you would rather hand the full workflow to a dedicated analyst you can set up an ongoing statistician engagement. Share your research question, your data, and the decision you are stuck on, and a PhD methodologist replies with a fixed-fee plan, the recommended approach, and a timeline. Get a free quote or see the pricing details. If the work turns out to be a full evidence synthesis rather than a single analysis, our systematic review support and meta-analysis support carry the statistics through end to end.

For the full engagement model, turnaround, and a fixed quote, see our statistical consulting service.

Frequently Asked Questions

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A statistical consultant helps researchers design studies, select the correct statistical tests, run and check the analysis, and interpret the results for publication. The role spans advice at the design stage, hands-on analysis in software such as R, Stata, SPSS, or SAS, and a written interpretation you can defend in peer review.
Cost depends on the complexity of the analysis, the condition and size of your data, how many models and outcomes are involved, and how much write-up you need. We never charge by the hour. After reviewing your question and data we return a single fixed fee, approved before any work begins and priced the same for every client worldwide.
The best time is at the design stage, before data collection, because the wrong design cannot be fixed with analysis afterward. The next best times are mid-project, when the analysis outgrows a spreadsheet or single calculator, and after a reviewer requests an analysis your team has not run before.
A biostatistician specialises in health and life-science data such as clinical trials, epidemiology, and survival analysis. A general statistical consultant works across the social, behavioural, physical, and policy sciences. We offer both: clinical work goes through our biostatistics consulting, and general research statistics through this statistical consulting service.
Yes. Every engagement includes the full annotated code in R, Stata, SPSS, or SAS, the cleaned dataset, and the output files, so you or a reviewer can re-run any analysis and verify the results.
Yes. Our statistical interpretation service takes your existing output and explains what it means in clear, publication-ready language, including whether assumptions were met and how to report the findings accurately. This is a common one-off engagement before submission or a defense.
Try the free tools first: regression calculator, sample size calculator, and power analysis calculator. When the question outgrows the tool, a statistical consultant takes it from there.

Disclaimer

This page is for informational purposes. Research Gold provides professional statistical consulting support to assist researchers. Always consult your supervisor, institutional review board, or domain experts for decisions specific to your project.

Ready for expert statistical guidance? Get a free quote or view pricing details.
Prof. David Okonkwo

Methodology reviewed by

Prof. David Okonkwo

Director of Biostatistics
Meta-AnalysisNetwork Meta-AnalysisR / Stata

PhD in Biostatistics, twenty years in applied statistics. Owns pairwise and network meta-analysis output, individual-participant-data work, and the final numeric check before any quantitative deliverable ships.

How it works

Our statistical consulting process

Each project follows the same five steps so you know exactly where your work is at any point.

  1. 1

    Discovery brief

    You tell us in writing your research question, data, and where you need statistical guidance.

  2. 2

    Analysis strategy

    We recommend the right design, tests, and sample size, with a written rationale.

  3. 3

    Analysis

    Modelling in R, Stata, SPSS, or SAS with annotated, reproducible code.

  4. 4

    Tables, figures, prose

    Journal or report-style outputs and a results-section draft.

  5. 5

    Written interpretation

    A written handoff explaining every result so you can defend the analysis.

What you receive

Every statistical consulting order ships with

  • Written analysis plan and test-selection rationale
  • Annotated R, Stata, SPSS, or SAS code
  • Cleaned dataset and variable codebook
  • Publication or report-ready tables and figures
  • Results-section prose written for your manuscript or report
  • Written interpretation walkthrough

Verified client reviews

What clients say about our statistical consulting

5.0 / 5(1 verified review)
The process went very smooth, the work was delivered on time and it was very perfectly done, and the changes were also made on time and as guided. Thank you so much for your work done on time and with good efforts.

Vidhi

New Zealand

Reviews are invited by email once a project has been delivered, and every submission is moderated before publication.

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R, Stata, SPSS, SAS • PhD Methodologists • Design, analysis, interpretation • Mutual NDA on request.