Among the exciting features of ferromagnetism in amorphous materials, the role played by the magnetic anisotropy and magnetostriction is of great interest both from a fundamental and technological point of view. It is well stablished that there is a dependence of the saturation magnetostriction on the applied stress. Such an effect has been recently explained as arising from a distribution of the magnetostriction coefficient within a given sample. The existence of a distribution of the anisotropy is well known even in the most carefully annealed samples. In the present work we discuss the possible origin of anisotropy and magnetostriction coefficient distributions, the effects on the magnetization curve and its evolution as a function of the applied stress. Methods for experimentally determining such a distribution are now available and new experimental results on the distribution of anisotropy field in wires and ribbons are also presented.