Analysis of Statistical Data

Central Tendency (Center) and

Dispersion (Variability)
 Central tendency: measures the degree to which
scores are clustered around the mean of a
distribution

 Dispersion: measures the fluctuations (variability)

around the characteristics of central tendency
Measures of Center
• A measure along the horizontal axis of
the data that locates the center of the
distribution.
Arithmetic Mean or Average
• The mean of a set of measurements is
the sum of the measurements divided
by the total number of measurements.
n

x i
x i 1
n

where n = number of measurements

 xi  sum of all the measurements
 Example
•The set: 2, 9, 1, 5, 6

 xi 2  9  1 1  5  6 3 3
x     6 .6
n 5 5

If we were able to enumerate the whole

population, the population mean would be
called m (the Greek letter “mu”).
 Example:
 Resistance of 5 coils:
3.35, 3.37, 3.28, 3.34, 3.30 ohm.
 The average:

x i
3.35  3.37  3.28  3.34  3.30
x i 1
  3.33
n 5
Weighted Mean
 The Weighted mean of the positive real numbers
x1,x2, ..., xn with their weight w1,w2, ..., wn is defined
n


to be
wi xi
i 1
x n

w
i 1
i

Example
Geometric Mean
 Geometric mean is defined as the positive root of the
product of observations. Symbolically,

GM  ( x1 x2 x3  xn ) 1/ n

 It is also often used for a set of numbers whose values are

are exponential in nature, such as data on the growth of the
human population or interest rates of a financial
investment.

 Find geometric mean of rate of growth: 34, 27, 45, 55, 22, 34
 Harmonic Mean
 The harmonic mean is the number of variables divided
by the sum of the reciprocals of the variables.
n
HM  n
1

i 1 xi

 Useful for ratios such as speed (=distance/time) etc.

 Exercise: Find the the harmonic mean of 1, 2, and 4

Median
• The median of a set of observations is
the middle measurement when the
observations are ranked from smallest
to largest or smallest to largest.
• The position of the median is
(n + 1)/2

once the measurements have been

ordered.
 Example
 The set : 2, 4, 9, 8, 6, 5, 3 n=7
 Sort : 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9
 Position: .5(n + 1) = .5(7 + 1) = 4th
Median = 4th largest measurement

• The set: 2, 4, 9, 8, 6, 5 n=6

• Sort: 2, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9
• Position: .5(n + 1) = .5(6 + 1) = 3.5th
Median = (5 + 6)/2 = 5.5 — average of the 3rd and 4th
measurements
 Mode
• The mode is the measurement which occurs
most frequently.
• The set: 2, 4, 9, 8, 8, 5, 3
• The mode is 8, which occurs twice
• The set: 2, 2, 9, 8, 8, 5, 3
• There are two modes—8 and 2 (bimodal)
• The set: 2, 4, 9, 8, 5, 3
• There is no mode (each value is unique).
Example
The number of quarts of milk purchased by 25
households:
0 0 1 1 1 1 1 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 3 3
3 3 3 4 4 4 5
 Mean?
 xi 55
x   2.2 10/25

n 25 8/25

Relative frequency
 Median? 6/25

m2 4/25

 Mode? (Highest peak) 2/25

mode  2
0
0 1 2 3 4 5
Quarts
Extreme Values
 The mean is more easily affected by extremely
large or small values than the median.

•The median is often used as a measure of

center when the distribution is skewed.
Extreme Values

Symmetric: Mean = Median

Skewed right: Mean > Median

Skewed left: Mean < Median

 Measures of Variability
• A measure along the horizontal axis of the data distribution
that describes the spread of the distribution from the center.

 Range
Difference between maximum and minimum values
 Interquartile Range

Difference between third and first quartile (Q3 - Q1)

 Variance

Average of the squared deviations from the mean

 Standard Deviation

Square root of the variance

Variability

Variability

No Variability
The Range
• The range, R, of a set of n measurements is the
difference between the largest and smallest
measurements.
• Example: A botanist records the number of
petals on 5 flowers:
5, 12, 6, 8, 14
• The range is R = 14 – 5 = 9.
Quartiles

Q1 Q2 Q3

25% 25% 25% 25%

 Percentile
50th Percentile  Median (Q2)
25th Percentile  Lower Quartile (Q )
1
75th Percentile  Upper Quartile (Q )
3

Interquartile Range:
IQR=Q3 – Q1
• The position of p-th percentile is 0.p(n + 1)

• The position of Q1 is 0.25(n + 1)

•The position of Q3 is 0.75(n + 1)

once the measurements have been ordered.

Example
The prices ($) of 18 brands of walking shoes:
40 60 65 65 65 68 68 70 70
70 70 70 70 74 75 75 90 95

Position of Q1 = 0.25(18 + 1) = 4.75

Position of Q3 = 0.75(18 + 1) = 14.25

Q1is 3/4 of the way between the 4th and 5th ordered
measurements, or Q1 = 65 + 0.75(65 - 65) = 65.
Example
The prices ($) of 18 brands of walking shoes:
40 60 65 65 65 68 68 70 70
70 70 70 70 74 75 75 90 95

Position of Q1 = 0.25(18 + 1) = 4.75

Position of Q3 = 0.75(18 + 1) = 14.25

Q3 is 1/4 of the way between the 14th and 15th

ordered measurements, or
Q3 = 74 + .25(75 - 74) = 74.25
and
IQR = Q3 – Q1 = 74.25 - 65 = 9.25
 90-th percentile P90
 The position of 90-th percentile is
0.9(18 + 1)=17.1

The prices ($) of 18 brands of walking shoes:

40 60 65 65 65 68 68 70 70
70 70 70 70 74 75 75 90 95

P90 = 90 + .10 (95-90) = 90.5

The Variance
• The variance is measure of variability that uses
all the measurements. It measures the average
deviation of the measurements about their
mean.
• Flower petals: 5, 12, 6, 8, 14

45
x 9
5
4 6 8 10 12 14
The Variance
• The variance of a population of N measurements
is the average of the squared deviations of the
measurements about their mean m.
 ( x  m ) 2
 
2 i
N
• The variance of a sample of n measurements is the sum
of the squared deviations of the measurements about their
mean, divided by (n – 1).

 ( xi  x ) 2
s 
2

n 1
The Standard Deviation
• In calculating the variance, we squared all of
the deviations, and in doing so changed the
scale of the measurements.
• To return this measure of variability to the
original units of measure, we calculate the
standard deviation, the positive square root of
the variance.
P o p ulatio n stand ard d eviatio n :    2

S amp le stand ard d eviatio n : s  s2

Two Ways to Calculate the Sample
Variance Use the Definition Formula:

xi  x ( xi  x )2  ( x  x ) 2
s2  i
5 -4 16 n 1
12 3 9
60
6 -3 9   15
8 -1 1 4
14 5 25 s  s 
2
1 5  3 .8 7
Sum 45 0 60
Two Ways to Calculate the Sample
Variance
Use the calculation formula:
x2
(  xi ) 2
 xi 
i 2

5 25
s2  n
12 144 n 1
6 36 2
45
8 64 465 
 5  15
14 196
4
Sum 45 465
s  s 
2
1 5  3 .8 7
Example- ungrouped data
 Sample: Moisture content (%) of kraft paper are:
6.7, 6.0, 6.4, 6.4, 5.9, and 5.8.

(231.26)  (37.2) 2 6
s  0.35
(6  1)
 Sample standard deviation, s = 0.35
Using Measures of Center and Spread:
The Empirical Rule
Given a distribution of measurements

The interval m   contains approximately 68% of the

measurements.
The interval m  2 contains approximately 95% of
the measurements.
The interval m  3 contains approximately 99.7% of
the measurements.
The Empirical Rule: An Example
Measures of Relative Standing
• Where does one particular measurement stand in
relation to the other measurements in the data
set?
• How many standard deviations away from the
mean does the measurement lie? This is measured
by the z-score.

Suppose s = 2. s
x x 4
z - s co re  s s
s
x 5 x9
x = 9 lies z =2 std dev from the mean.
z-Scores
• z-scores between –2 and 2 are not unusual. z-scores
should not be more than 3 in absolute value. z-scores
larger than 3 in absolute value would indicate a
possible outlier.

Outlier Not unusual Outlier

z

-3 -2 -1 0 1 2 3
Somewhat unusual
Example of z-Scores
X z-Score X z-Score
10 -1.28244 10 -0.29204
15 0.625954 500 3.473714
10 -1.28244 10 -0.29204
16 1.007634 16 -0.24593
11 -0.90076 11 -0.28435
17 1.389313 17 -0.23824
14 0.244275 14 -0.2613
13 -0.1374 13 -0.26898
10 -1.28244 10 -0.29204
16 1.007634 16 -0.24593
11 -0.90076 11 -0.28435
17 1.389313 17 -0.23824
14 0.244275 14 -0.2613
13 -0.1374 13 -0.26898
Coefficient of Variation(CV)
 When comparing between data sets with different units
or widely different means, one should use the
coefficient of variation for comparison instead of the
standard deviation.
 The Coefficient of Variation can be written as

s
CV 
x
 We express CV as a percentage by multiplying 100
 Example: Page 181
 Skewness
 Skewness measures the degree of asymmetry exhibited
by the data

 The data can exhibits +ve skewness or –ve skewness

 If the mean of the data is greater than its median, the

data is positively skewed; and if the mean of the data is
less than its median, the data is negatively skewed
n

 (x  x)
i
3

 Mathematically, skewness  i 1
ns 3

37
Skewness

Mean Mode Mean Mean

Mode
Median
Median Mode Median

Negatively Symmetric Positively

Skewed (Not Skewed) Skewed
 Kurtosis
 Kurtosis measure the peaking of the data relative to the
normal distribution

 Data with high degree of peakeness is said to be

leptokurtic and have the kaurtosis value more than 3

 Flat data has the kurtosis value of less than 3, and it is

called platykurtic n

 i
( x  x ) 4

 Mathematically, kurtosis  i 1
ns 4
39
Kurtosis
 Peakedness of a distribution
 Leptokurtic: high and thin
 Mesokurtic: normal in shape
 Platykurtic: flat and spread out

Leptokurtic

Mesokurtic
Platykurtic
Skewness and Kurtosis

41