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¶ … median and the mode. The mean is the average of the total set, the median is the middle of the total set and the mode is the most frequently reported number of the total set. The median can be found by literally writing the numbers in a string, and then finding the number that sits exactly in the middle. When measuring family wealth in order to make political decisions, it is the median that is the most important of these three (Boeree, 2005).
The mean reflects the average of all the different numbers within the set. The mean is not a bad number with which to work, but it can be skewed upward or downward by very large outliers. For example, consider the set 1, 1, 3, 4, 2, 3, 1, 22. The mean of this set is 4.625. The median is 2.5 and the mode is 1. The mean is above all of the numbers in the set, except for one number (22). If these were measures of family wealth, the one rich family (22) would...
7/8 of the country would actually fall below the mean. Large outliers skew the mean, and this happens with family income as well. Some American families have wealth that is in the billions, or even just the hundreds of millions. That wealth is equivalent to hundreds or even thousands of ordinary families. As a result, the mean figure is skewed upward, and probably lies in the 70th or 80th percentiles, rather than the 50th percentile where it should be.
The mode is equally troublesome in this instance. The mode in the example set is 1, because it is the most frequently reported number. However, the mode is at the low end of the figures reported. It happens that the mode is reported more than any other, but it does not represent the typical experience. When looking at American family wealth, it is entirely possible that…
Works Cited:
Boeree, C. (2005). Descriptive statistics. Ship.edu. Retrieved October 23, 2012 from http://webspace.ship.edu/cgboer/descstats.html
QuickMBA. (2010). Central tendency. QuickMBA.com. Retrieved October 23, 2012 from http://www.quickmba.com/stats/centralten/
A standard deviation is so "standardized" that, generally speaking, 70% of the data points will fall within one standard deviation, and 90% of the data points will fall within two standard deviations. Standard deviation is one of the most common ways for researchers to describe data as it forms a basis for comparing data from study to study. Measures of central tendency are most effective at describing data that shows
When the examples are spread apart and the bell curve is relatively flat, that tells you there is a relatively large standard deviation (Niles). The average deviation is the absolute value of the difference from the mean for each data value, summed, then divided by the number of values. Therefore, the average deviation, like the standard deviation is the measure or spread of all values in a series of observations.
MathA) To find the mean, we add up all the numbers and divide by the total number of numbers:5 + 7 + 3 + 8 + 2 + 3 + 3 + 1 + 9 = 41There are 9 numbers in the list, so the mean is:mean = 41/9 ? 4.56To find the median, we first need to put the numbers in order from smallest to largest:1, 2, 3, 3,
GPA is interval level data one can report all measures of central tendency and dispersion (Creswell, 2012). In the original data case 38 had a GPA reported as 9.00. This value is of course impossible and since there were no missing values defined in the data set this case was treated as missing data. If used as reported it would have resulted in a much larger standard deviation and
This distribution can be applied to multiple business situations even where data is distributed differently, because a normal distribution adopts the central limit theorem which suggests that no matter how a population is distributed, the distribution "of the means of random samples approaches a normal distribution for a large sample size" (ICMBA, 2002). Business executives can use normal business distribution to create diversified asset portfolios, to calculate process variations within
Using this data set we can calculate mean, median, mode, and standard deviation for this data set over last 20 years: Mean can be found according to the following formula: So mean February temperature equals to 33.825 F Median of the data is the middle score after data has been set in order, so February temperature median equals to 33.7 F Mode of the data is the value from data set which occurs