Mean, Median and Mode

from Ungrouped and Grouped Frequencies

Mean for Ungrouped Data:

Let's start off with some raw data (not a grouped frequency) ...

Example: Alex did a survey of how many games each of 20 friends owned, and got this:

9, 15, 11, 12, 3, 5, 10, 20, 14, 6, 8, 8, 12, 12, 18, 15, 6, 9, 18, 11

To find the Mean , add up all the numbers, then divide by how many numbers there are:

9+15+11+12+3+5+10+20+14+6+8+8+12+12+18+15+6+9+18+11
Mean = = 11.1
20

Median for Ungrouped Data:

The following steps may be followed in the computation of the median from ungrouped
data:
1. List the observations in the order of magnitude
2. Count the number of observations. This is n
1
3. The median is the value that corresponds to the observation number (𝑛 + 1) if n is odd.
2
1 𝑛 𝑛
4. The median is the value that corresponds to the observation number [ + ( + 1)] ,if n
2 2 2
is even.
Example 1:
The weights of 11 mothers in kg were recorded as follows:
47, 44, 42, 41, 58, 52, 55, 39, 40,43,61
Find the median weight of mothers
Example 2:
The weights of 10 mothers in kg were recorded as follows:
47, 44, 42, 41, 58, 52, 39, 40,43,61
Find the median weight of mothers

Mode for Ungrouped Data:

To find the Mode , or modal value, place the numbers in value order then count how many
of each number. The Mode is the number which appears most often (you can have more
than one mode):

3, 5, 6, 6, 8, 8, 9, 9, 10, 11, 11, 12, 12, 12 , 14, 15, 15, 18, 18, 20:

12 appears three times, more often than the other values, so Mode = 12

Grouped Data

Now, let's make a Grouped Frequency Distribution of data:

Number of Frequency Mid Point (x) f× 𝒙

games (f)

1 up to 6 2 3.5

6 up to 11 7 8.5

11 up to 16 8 13.5

16 up to 21 3 18.5

Total

can you calculate the Mean, Median and Mode from just this table?

The answer is . Not accurately anyway. But, we can make estimates.

Estimating the Mean from Grouped Data
So all we have left is:

 The groups (1 up to 6, 6 up to 11, etc) also called class intervals, are of width 5
 The numbers 1, 6, 11 and 16 are the lower class limit
 The numbers 6, 11, 16 and 21 are the upper class limit
 The midpoints are halfway between the lower and upper class boundaries
 So the midpoints are 3.5, 8.5, 13.5 and 18.5

We can estimate the Mean by using the midpoints.

So an estimate of the mean number of games is:

∑𝑓𝑥
Estimated Mean = =
∑𝑓

Estimating the Median from Grouped Data

To estimate the Median, let's look at our data again:

But if we need to estimate a single Median value we can use this formula:

(n/2) − cfb
Estimated Median = L + ×w
fm

where:

 L is the lower class boundary of the group containing the median

 n is the total number of data
 cfb is the cumulative frequency of the groups before the median group
 fm is the frequency of the median group
 w is the group width

Estimating the Mode from Grouped Data

Again, looking at our data:

Number of Frequency
games

1 up to 6 2

6 up to 11 7

11 up to 16 8

16 up to 21 3

We can easily identify the modal group (the group with the highest frequency), which is 11
up to 16

We can say "the modal group is 11 up to 16"

But the actual Mode may not even be in that group! Or there may be more than one mode.
Without the raw data we don't really know.

But, we can estimate the Mode using the following formula:

fm − fm-1
Estimated Mode = L + ×w
(fm − fm-1) + (fm − fm+1)

where:

 L is the lower class boundary of the modal group

 fm-1 is the frequency of the group before the modal group
 fm is the frequency of the modal group
 fm+1 is the frequency of the group after the modal group
 w is the group width

In this example:

 L = 11
 fm-1 = 7
 fm = 8
 fm+1 = 3
 w=5

8−7
Estimated Mode = 11 + × 5 = 11 + (1/6) × 5 = 11.833...
(8 − 7) + (8 − 3)

Example 1: You grew fifty baby carrots using special soil. You dig them
up and measure their lengths and group the results:

Length (mm) Frequency

150 up to 155 5

155 up to 160 2

160 up to 165 6

165 up to 170 8

170 up to 175 9

175 up to 180 11

180 up to 185 6

185 up to 190 3

Find Mean and Mode

Example 2: The ages of the 112 people who live on a tropical island were
grouped as follows:

Age Number

0 up to 10 20

10 up to 20 21

20 up to 30 23

30 up to 40 16

40 up to 50 11
50 up to 60 10

60 up to 70 7

70 up to 80 3

80 up to 89 1
Find Mean and Mode

Quartiles Percentiles and Deciles

Quartiles
The quartiles are the three values of the data that divide an ordered data set into
four equal parts.
Q1, Q2 and Q3 determine the values for 25%, 50% and 75% of the data
Deciles
The deciles are the nine values of the variable that divide an ordered data set into
ten equal parts.
The deciles determine the values for 10%, 20%... and 90% of the data.
𝐷5 Coincides with the median.
Percentiles
The percentiles are the 99 values of the variable that divide an ordered data set
into 100 equal parts.
The percentiles determine the values for 1%, 2%... and 99% of the data.
𝑃50 Coincides with the median.

Percentile for Ungrouped Data:

14.6, 24.3, 24.9, 27.0, 27.2, 27.4, 28.2, 28.8, 29.9, 30.7, 31.5, 31.6, 32.3, 32.8, 33.3, 33.6, 34.3, 36.9, 38.3,
44.0

Here n= 20

Step 1 :

Organize the data into an ascending-order array

Step 2:

Find the Location of ith percentile:

𝑖
𝐿𝑖 = (𝑛 + 1)
100
If we want to find the 67th percentile then we have the location of 67th percentile is
67
𝐿67 = × (20 + 1)=14.07th observation.
100

Step 3:

If 𝐿𝑝 𝑖𝑠 𝑛𝑜𝑡 𝑎 𝑤ℎ𝑜𝑙𝑒 𝑛𝑢𝑚𝑏𝑒𝑟 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑛 𝑓𝑖𝑛𝑑 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑝𝑒𝑟𝑐𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑒 𝑙𝑖𝑘𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠

Then our 67th percentile value is= 14th observation + (.07 × (15th observation – 14th observation))

= 32.8 + (.07 × (33.3 − 32.8))

= 32.835

Percentile for Grouped Data:

The 𝑖𝑡ℎ percentile of a grouped distribution for n observations may be arrived at by using the following
formula:
(𝑖 × 𝑛)
−𝐹
𝑃𝑖 = 𝐿𝑖 + 100 ×ℎ
𝑓𝑖
Where,
 𝐿𝑖 = 𝐿𝑜𝑤𝑒𝑟 𝑙𝑖𝑚𝑖𝑡 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑝𝑒𝑟𝑐𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑒 𝑐𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑠
𝐹 = 𝐶𝑢𝑚𝑢𝑙𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑣𝑒 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝑞𝑢𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑦 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑐𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑠 𝑝𝑟𝑖𝑜𝑟 𝑡𝑜 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑝𝑒𝑟𝑐𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑒 𝑐𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑠
𝑓𝑖 = 𝐹𝑟𝑒𝑞𝑢𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑦 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑝𝑒𝑟𝑐𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑒 𝑐𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑠
ℎ = 𝑊𝑖𝑑𝑡ℎ 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑐𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑠 𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑣𝑎𝑙
𝑛 = 𝑡𝑜𝑡𝑎𝑙 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝑞𝑢𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑦

Class Frequency Cumulative Frequency

150 up to 155 8 8
155 up to 160 16 24
160 up to 165 23 47
165 up to 170 7 54
170 up to 175 19 73
Total n=73

Steps to find Percentile for grouped data:

Step 1:

Find the cumulative frequency distribution from frequency distribution

Step 2:
𝑖×𝑛 30×73
If you want to find the 𝑖𝑡ℎ percentile / 30th percentile (i=30) then find the value = = 21.9
100 100

Step 3:

Look at cumulative frequency table. 21.9 belong to the class (155 up to 160 )

So 155 up to 160 is our 30th percentile class.

Step 4:

Now,

𝐿𝑖 (𝐿30 ) = 𝐿𝑜𝑤𝑒𝑟 𝑙𝑖𝑚𝑖𝑡 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑖𝑡ℎ (30𝑡ℎ) 𝑝𝑒𝑟𝑐𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑒 𝑐𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑠= 155

𝐹 = 𝐶𝑢𝑚𝑢𝑙𝑎𝑡𝑖𝑣𝑒 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝑞𝑢𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑦 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑐𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑠 𝑝𝑟𝑖𝑜𝑟 𝑡𝑜 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑖𝑡ℎ (30𝑡ℎ)𝑝𝑒𝑟𝑐𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑒 𝑐𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑠=8

𝑓𝑖 (𝑓30 ) = 𝐹𝑟𝑒𝑞𝑢𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑦 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑖𝑡ℎ(30𝑡ℎ) 𝑝𝑒𝑟𝑐𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑙𝑒 𝑐𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑠=16

ℎ = 𝑊𝑖𝑑𝑡ℎ 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑐𝑙𝑎𝑠𝑠 𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑣𝑎𝑙=5

𝑛 = 𝑡𝑜𝑡𝑎𝑙 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝑞𝑢𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑦=73
Step 5:

Now , 30th percentile can be calculate as:

30 × 73
−8
𝑃30 = 155 + 100 ×5
16
= 159.34

Median for grouped data:

Median for grouped data can be obtain by calculating 50th percentile
Median= 50th percentile

Quartiles
1st Quartile = 25th percentile
2nd Quartile = Median = 50th Percentile
3rd Quartile = 75th Percentile

Deciles
1st Decile = 𝐷1 = 10th Percentile
2nd Decile = 𝐷2 =20th Percentile
:
9th Decile = 𝐷9 =90th Percentile

Exercises:
Exercises: 1,2,3,4,5,6 (Page 60 ) for Mean
Exercises: 11, 12, 13, 14 (Page 110 -111) for Quartile, Percentile and decile
Exercises: 58, 59 (Mean) (page 88)
Exercise: 80 (b), 81 (a) (page 94)