Describing Data Distributions

Front

What is an outlier in a data distribution?

Back

An outlier is a data point that differs significantly from other observations in a dataset. It can be much higher or lower than the rest of the data.

Front

How do you determine the median of a dataset?

Back

To find the median, arrange all numbers in order from least to greatest and identify the middle number. If there is an even number of observations, the median is the average of the two middle numbers.

Front

What does a box and whisker plot represent?

Back

A box and whisker plot visually displays the distribution of a dataset, showing the median, quartiles, and potential outliers.

Front

What is the difference between mean and median?

Back

The mean is the average of all data points, while the median is the middle value when the data is ordered. They can differ significantly, especially in skewed distributions.

Front

What does it mean if the mean is greater than the median?

Back

If the mean is greater than the median, it indicates that the data distribution is positively skewed, meaning there are higher values pulling the mean up.

Front

What is the mode of a dataset?

Back

The mode is the value that appears most frequently in a dataset. A dataset can have one mode, more than one mode, or no mode at all.

Front

How do you identify the range of a dataset?

Back

The range is calculated by subtracting the smallest value from the largest value in the dataset.

Front

What does it mean for data to be 'spread out'?

Back

Data is considered 'spread out' when there is a large range or variance among the values, indicating more variability in the dataset.

Front

What is a skewed distribution?

Back

A skewed distribution is one where the data points are not symmetrically distributed, leading to a longer tail on one side of the distribution.

Front

What is the purpose of using a histogram?

Back

A histogram is used to represent the frequency distribution of numerical data, allowing for visual interpretation of the data's distribution.