David Cox (statistician)

Cox was born in Birmingham on 15 July 1924.{{Cite web|title='Genius' statistician and Honorary Fellow dies aged 97 {{!}} StJohns|url=https://www.joh.cam.ac.uk/genius-statistician-and-honorary-fellow-dies-aged-97|access-date=21 January 2022|website=www.joh.cam.ac.uk}}{{Cite news |url=https://www.newspapers.com/clip/93122681/todays-birthdays-15-jul-2010-the-dail/ |title=Today's Birthdays |newspaper=The Daily Telegraph |page=28 |date=15 July 2010 |via=Newspapers.com |access-date=21 January 2022}}{{Open access}} His father was a die sinker and part-owner of a jewellery shop, and they lived near the Jewellery Quarter.{{Cite web |url=https://www.ukdataservice.ac.uk/teaching-resources/pioneers/pioneer-detail?id=pioneer_people_cox |title=David Cox |website=ukdataservice.ac.uk |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161012085302/https://www.ukdataservice.ac.uk/teaching-resources/pioneers/pioneer-detail?id=pioneer_people_cox |archive-date=12 October 2016 |url-status=dead}} The aeronautical engineer Harold Roxbee Cox was a distant cousin.{{cite journal |last1=Cox |first1=Harold Roxbee |title=Myself, when young |journal=Aeronautical Journal |date=April 1999 |volume=103 |issue=1022 |pages=178–180 |url=http://lordkingsnorton.cranfield.ac.uk/archive%20docs/aeronautical1999.pdf|doi=10.1017/S0001924000096433|s2cid=113908453 }} He attended Handsworth Grammar School, Birmingham.{{Cite web |url=https://www.handsworth.bham.sch.uk/history/alumni/ |title=Famous Alumni |access-date=21 January 2022 |website=Handsworth Grammar School}} He received a Master of Arts in mathematics at St John's College, Cambridge,{{Cite web |url=https://www.aapss.org/fellow/sir-david-cox/ |title=Sir David Cox |website=American Academy of Political and Social Science |date=8 August 2016 |access-date=21 January 2022}} and obtained his PhD from the University of Leeds in 1949, advised by Henry Daniels and Bernard Welch. His dissertation was entitled Theory of Fibre Motion.{{Mathgenealogy|id=70804}}

Cox was employed from 1944 to 1946 at the Royal Aircraft Establishment, from 1946 to 1950 at the Wool Industries Research Association in Leeds,{{cite encyclopedia| url=https://www.britannica.com/biography/David-Cox-British-statistician| title=Sir David Cox, British statistician| access-date=11 October 2016|date=13 February 2015| first=Erik |last=Gregersen| encyclopedia=Encyclopædia Britannica}} and from 1950 to 1955 worked at the Statistical Laboratory at the University of Cambridge. From 1956 to 1966 he was Reader and then Professor of Statistics at Birkbeck College, London. In 1966, he took up the Chair position in Statistics at Imperial College London where he later became head of the mathematics department. In 1988 he became Warden of Nuffield College and a member of the Department of Statistics at Oxford University. He formally retired from these positions in 1994, but continued to work at Oxford.{{Cite press release |url=https://www.frontiersofknowledgeawards-fbbva.es/noticias/the-bbva-foundation-distinguishes-david-cox-and-bradley-efron-for-revolutionizing-statistics-and-making-it-into-an-indispensable-tool-for-other-sciences/ |title=The BBVA Foundation distinguishes David Cox and Bradley Efron for revolutionizing statistics and making it an indispensable tool for other sciences |website=BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Awards |date=24 January 2017 |access-date=20 January 2022}}

Cox supervised, collaborated with, and encouraged many notable researchers prominent in statistics. He collaborated with George Box on a study of transformations such as the Box–Cox transformation and they were especially delighted to be credited as Box and Cox.{{citation |newspaper=The Times |title=Professor Sir David Cox |page=79 |date=29 January 2022 |number=73693 |url=https://www.thetimes.com/uk/healthcare/article/professor-sir-david-cox-7skkzp3bn}}{{cite journal |last1=Box |first1=George E. P. |author-link=George E. P. Box |last2=Cox |first2=D. R. |author-link2=David Cox (statistician) |title=An analysis of transformations |journal=Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, Series B |volume=26 |issue=2 |pages=211–252 |year=1964 |doi=10.1111/j.2517-6161.1964.tb00553.x |mr=192611 |jstor=2984418 }} He was the doctoral advisor of David Hinkley, Peter McCullagh, Basilio de Bragança Pereira, Wally Smith, Gauss Moutinho Cordeiro, Valerie Isham, Henry Wynn, Claudio Di Veroli and Jane Hutton. He served as president of the Bernoulli Society from 1979 to 1981,{{cite web |title=History |url=http://www.bernoulli-society.org/history |website=www.bernoulli-society.org |access-date=20 January 2022 |archive-date=28 September 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210928075711/http://bernoulli-society.org/history |url-status=dead }} of the Royal Statistical Society from 1980 to 1982,{{cite web |title=Sir David Cox, 1924-2022 |url=https://rss.org.uk/news-publication/news-publications/2022/general-news/sir-david-cox-1924-2022/ |website=RSS |access-date=20 January 2022}} and of the International Statistical Institute from 1995 to 1997.{{cite web |title=History of the International Statistical Institute {{!}} ISI |url=https://www.isi-web.org/about/history |website=www.isi-web.org |access-date=20 January 2022 |archive-date=16 December 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221216054617/https://www.isi-web.org/about/history |url-status=dead }} He was an Honorary Fellow of Nuffield College and St John's College, Cambridge, and was a member of the Department of Statistics at the University of Oxford.

In 1947, Cox married Joyce Drummond, and they had four children.{{Cite journal | author = Nancy Reid | title = A Conversation with Sir David Cox | journal = Statistical Science | volume = 9 | issue = 3 |date=August 1994 | pages = 439–455 | doi = 10.1214/ss/1177010394|jstor= 2246357| author-link = Nancy Reid | doi-access = free }} He died on 18 January 2022, at the age of 97.{{cite web |title=Sir David Cox, 1924-2022 |url=https://www.nuffield.ox.ac.uk/news-events/news/sir-david-cox-1924-2022/ |website=Nuffield College Oxford University |access-date=20 January 2022 |language=en}}{{Cite web | url=https://www.joh.cam.ac.uk/genius-statistician-and-honorary-fellow-dies-aged-97 | title='Genius' statistician and Honorary Fellow dies aged 97 | StJohns }}

Cox made pioneering and important contributions to numerous areas of statistics and applied probability, of which the best known are:

• Logistic regression, which is employed when the variable to be predicted is categorical (i.e., can take a limited number of values, e.g., gender, race (in the US census)), binary (a special case of categorical with only two values - e.g., success/failure, disease/no disease), or ordinal, where the categories can be ranked (e.g., pain intensity can be absent, mild, moderate, severe, unbearable). Cox's 1958 paper{{cite journal|last1=Cox|first1=DR|title=The regression analysis of binary sequences (with discussion)|journal=J R Stat Soc B|date=1958|volume=20|issue=2|pages=215–242|doi=10.1111/j.2517-6161.1958.tb00292.x |jstor=2983890}} and further publications in the 1960s addressed the case of binary logistic regression.{{cite book

| last = Cramer | first = J. S.

| contribution = The origins and development of the logit model

| contribution-url = https://www.cambridge.org/ua/files/2013/6690/1022/1208_default.pdf

| date = August 2003

| doi = 10.1017/cbo9780511615412.010

| pages = 149–157

| publisher = Cambridge University Press

| title = Logit Models from Economics and Other Fields| isbn = 978-0-521-81588-8

}}

• The proportional hazards model, which is widely used in the analysis of survival data, was developed by him in 1972.{{cite journal |last1=Kalbfleisch |first1=John D. |last2=Schaubel |first2=Douglas E. |title=Fifty Years of the Cox Model |journal=Annual Review of Statistics and Its Application |date=10 March 2023 |volume=10 |issue=1 |pages=1–23 |doi=10.1146/annurev-statistics-033021-014043 |bibcode=2023AnRSA..10....1K |s2cid=253787572 |language=en |issn=2326-8298|doi-access=free }}{{cite journal | last=Cox | first=David R | author-link=David Cox (statistician) | year=1972 | journal=Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, Series B | volume=34 | issue=2 | title=Regression Models and Life-Tables | pages=187–220 | doi=10.1111/j.2517-6161.1972.tb00899.x | jstor=2985181 |mr=0341758}} An example of the use of the proportional hazards model is in survival analysis in medical research. The model can be used in clinical trials to investigate time-based information about cohorts of patients, such as their response to exposure to certain chemical substances.{{Cite journal |last1=Spruance |first1=Spotswood L. |last2=Reid |first2=Julia E. |last3=Grace |first3=Michael |last4=Samore |first4=Matthew |title=Hazard Ratio in Clinical Trials |year=2004 |journal=Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy |volume=48 |issue=8 |pages=2787–2792 |doi=10.1128/AAC.48.8.2787-2792.2004 |pmid=15273082 |pmc=478551 }}
• The Cox process was named after him.{{cite book|last=Singpurwalla|first=Nozer D.|title=Reliability and Risk: A Bayesian Perspective|url={{Google books|szLqBTXsyJQC|page=134|plainurl=yes}}|page=134|date=14 August 2006|publisher=John Wiley & Sons|isbn=978-0-470-06033-9|language=en}}

Cox received numerous awards and honours for his work. He was awarded the Guy Medals in Silver (1961) and Gold (1973) of the Royal Statistical Society.{{Cite magazine |url=https://magazine.amstat.org/blog/2015/08/01/penn-state-holds-2015-rao-prize-conference-to-honor-winners/ |title=Penn State Holds 2015 Rao Prize Conference to Honor Winners |date=1 August 2015 |magazine=AMSTATNEWS |publisher=American Statistical Association |access-date=21 January 2022}} He was elected Fellow of the Royal Society of London in 1973.{{Cite journal |last=Reid |first=Nancy |date=2024 |title=Sir David R. Cox. 15 July 1924 — 18 January 2022 |journal=Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society |volume=77|pages=69–91 |doi=10.1098/rsbm.2023.0052 |doi-access=free }} The next year, he was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.{{Cite web |title=David Roxbee Cox |url=https://www.amacad.org/person/david-roxbee-cox |access-date=2022-04-14 |website=American Academy of Arts & Sciences |language=en}} He was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 1985.{{London Gazette|issue=50221 |date=6 August 1985 |page=10815}} He was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 1990.{{Cite web |title=APS Member History |url=https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?creator=David+Cox&title=&subject=&subdiv=&mem=&year=&year-max=&dead=&keyword=&smode=advanced |access-date=2022-04-14 |website=search.amphilsoc.org}} Cox became an Honorary Fellow of the British Academy in 1997 and was a Fellow of the American Statistical Association.{{Cite web |url=https://www.thebritishacademy.ac.uk/fellows/david-cox-FBA-hon/ |title=Sir David Cox Hon FBA |website=British Academy |access-date=21 January 2022}} He was a Foreign Associate of the US National Academy of Sciences and a foreign member of the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters. In 1990, he won the Kettering Prize and Gold Medal for Cancer Research for "the development of the Proportional Hazard Regression Model." In 2010 he was awarded the Copley Medal of the Royal Society "for his seminal contributions to the theory and applications of statistics",{{cite web |url=https://royalsociety.org/people/david-cox-11275/ |title=David Cox| publisher=The Royal Society| access-date=11 October 2016}} the same year in which he was elected a foreign fellow of the Royal Society of Canada.{{cite web | url= https://www.mcgill.ca/environment/files/environment/RSC_NF_Citations_EN_FINAL_000.pdf| title = NEW FELLOWS 2010 | publisher = Royal Society of Canada| access-date = 29 September 2022}} He was also the first ever recipient of the International Prize in Statistics. He received the award in 2016.{{cite press release |last=Talley |first=Jill |date=19 October 2016 |title=International Prize in Statistics Awarded to Sir David Cox for Survival Analysis Model Applied in Medicine, Science, and Engineering |url=http://statprize.org/pdfs/Press-Release-International-Prize-Winner.pdf |publisher=American Statistical Association |access-date=20 October 2016}} In 2013 Cox was elected an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.{{Cite news|url=https://www.rse.org.uk/fellow/david-cox/|title=Sir David Cox FRS, HonFBA, HonFRSE - The Royal Society of Edinburgh|work=The Royal Society of Edinburgh|access-date=1 February 2018|language=en-GB|archive-date=2 February 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180202073052/https://www.rse.org.uk/fellow/david-cox/|url-status=dead}} In 2016, he won the BBVA Foundation Frontiers of Knowledge Award in the Basic Sciences category jointly with Bradley Efron, for the development of "pioneering and hugely influential" statistical methods that have proved indispensable for obtaining reliable results in a vast spectrum of disciplines from medicine to astrophysics, genomics or particle physics.

Cox wrote or co-authored over 300 papers and books.{{Cite web |url=https://www.nuff.ox.ac.uk/Users/Cox/Publications.html |title=Publications of Sir David Cox |access-date=21 January 2022 |website=Nuffield College}} From 1966 to 1991 he was the editor of Biometrika. His books are as follows:

• Planning of experiments (1958)
• Queues (Methuen, 1961). With Walter L. Smith
• Renewal Theory (Methuen, 1962).
• The theory of stochastic processes (1965). With Hilton David Miller
• Analysis of binary data (1969). With Joyce Snell
• Theoretical statistics (1974). With D. V. Hinkley
• Problems and Solutions in Theoretical Statistics (1978). With D. V. Hinkley
• Point Processes (Chapman & Hall/CRC, 1980). With Valerie Isham
• Applied statistics, principles and examples (Chapman & Hall/CRC, 1981). With Joyce Snell
• Analysis of survival data (Chapman & Hall/CRC, 1984). With David Oakes
• Asymptotic techniques for use in statistics. (1989) With Ole E. Barndorff-Nielsen
• Inference and asymptotics (Chapman & Hall/CRC, 1994). With Ole E. Barndorff-Nielsen
• Multivariate dependencies: models, analysis and interpretation (Chapman & Hall, 1995). With Nanny Wermuth
• The theory of design of experiments. (Chapman & Hall/CRC, 2000). With Nancy M. Reid
• Complex stochastic systems (Chapman & Hall/CRC, 2000). With Ole E. Barndorff-Nielsen and Claudia Klüppelberg
• Components of variance (Chapman & Hall/CRC, 2003). With P. J. Solomon
• Principles of Statistical Inference (Cambridge University Press, 2006). {{ISBN|978-0-521-68567-2}}
• [https://web.archive.org/web/20060114072317/http://www.cambridge.org/uk/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=052185816X#contributors Selected Statistical Papers of Sir David Cox 2 Volume Set]
• [https://www.amazon.com/Principles-Applied-Statistics-D-Cox/dp/1107644453/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1310742640&sr=8-1 Principles of Applied Statistics] (CUP). With Christl Donnelly

He was named editor of the following books:

• {{cite book|title=Complex Stochastic Systems |editor=D. R. Cox |editor2=D. M. Titterington |publisher=Royal Society| year=1991|isbn=978-0-85403-453-6}}
• {{cite book|title=The Collected Works of John W. Tukey: Factorial and ANOVA |volume=VII|url={{Google books|XrRtatL39qEC|plainurl=yes}} |editor=D. R. Cox |publisher=Taylor & Francis| year=1992|isbn=978-0-412-06321-3}}
• {{cite book|title=Time series models in econometrics, finance and others|url={{Google books|rB4lXAje3wEC|plainurl=yes}} |editor=D. R. Cox |editor2=D. V. Hinkley |editor3=Ole E. Barndorff-Nielsen |publisher=Taylor & Francis |year=1996|isbn=978-0-412-72930-0}}
• {{cite book|title= Biometrika: One Hundred Years |editor=D. M. Titterington |editor2=D. R. Cox |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2001 |isbn=978-0-19-850993-6 }}

The following book was published in his honour:

• [https://web.archive.org/web/20060509152059/http://www.oup.co.uk/isbn/0-19-856654-9 Celebrating Statistics: Papers in honour of Sir David Cox on his 80th birthday] {{ISBN|978-0-19-856654-0}}

• Logrank test

{{reflist}}

• {{cite web| url=http://www.statisticsviews.com/details/feature/5770651/I-would-like-to-think-of-myself-as-a-scientist-who-happens-largely-to-specialise.html| date=24 January 2014| title='I would like to think of myself as a scientist, who happens largely to specialise in the use of statistics'– An interview with Sir David Cox| website=Statistics Views| publisher=John Wiley & Sons| access-date=11 October 2016| archive-date=12 October 2016| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161012075559/http://www.statisticsviews.com/details/feature/5770651/I-would-like-to-think-of-myself-as-a-scientist-who-happens-largely-to-specialise.html| url-status=dead}}

{{Commons category|David Cox (statistician)}}

• [https://web.archive.org/web/20071011053333/http://www.stats.ox.ac.uk/people/academic_staff/david_cox Sir David Cox] – homepage at web-site of University of Oxford.
• The certificate of election to the Royal Society is available at [https://archive.today/20121223033837/http://www.royalsoc.ac.uk/DServe/dserve.exe?dsqIni=Dserve.ini&dsqApp=Archive&dsqCmd=Show.tcl&dsqSearch=RefNo=='EC/1973/08'&dsqDb=Catalog Cox, David Roxbee]
• There are two photographs at [http://www.york.ac.uk/depts/maths/histstat/people/welcome.htm#c Portraits of Statisticians]
• Cox's time in the Cambridge Statistical Laboratory is recounted in [http://www.statslab.cam.ac.uk/History/2history.html The History of the Cambridge Statistical Laboratory] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131219080017/http://www.statslab.cam.ac.uk/History/2history.html |date=19 December 2013 }}
• {{MathGenealogy|id=70804|name=David Roxbee Cox}}

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{{s-bef | before=Michael Brock}}

{{s-ttl | title=Warden of Nuffield College, Oxford | years=1988–1994}}

{{s-aft | after=Sir Anthony Atkinson}}

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{{Copley Medallists 2001–2050}}

{{Royal Statistical Society presidents}}

{{Guy Medal}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cox, David}}

Category:1924 births

Category:2022 deaths

Category:20th-century British mathematicians

Category:Academics of Birkbeck, University of London

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Category:Alumni of St John's College, Cambridge

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Category:Queueing theorists

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