William J. Youden

Who was William J. Youden?

William John Youden was a statistician who formulated new statistical techniques in statistical analysis and in designs for experimenters. He developed the "Youden square", an incomplete block design developed from a 1937 paper, "Use of Incomplete Block Replications in Estimating Tobacco Mosaic Virus". He also helped to introduce the concept of restricted randomization, which he called constrained randomization.

The American Statistical Association bestows the W. J. Youden Award in Interlaboratory Testing to authors "of publications that make outstanding contributions to the design and/or analysis of interlaboratory tests or describe ingenious approaches to the planning and evaluation of data from such tests." The award is presented each year at the Joint Statistical Meetings.