MEASURES OF CENTRAL TENDENCY
VARIABILITY
Lesson Objectives
At the end of this lesson, the students should be able to:
1. differentiate mean, median, and mode;
2. compute for the mean, the median, and the mode;
3. identify when to use the mean, the median, and the mode;
4. differentiate range, interquartile range, variance, and
standard deviation;
5. compute range, interquartile range, variance, and
standard deviation; and
6. analyze business data using the measures of variability.
Measures of Central Tendency
a summary measure that describes
a whole set of data with a single value
that represents the center of its distribution
Three ways of measuring central tendency:
1. Mean (x̄ ) – arithmetic average
2. Median (Md) – middle value
3. Mode (Mo) – highest frequency
The Mean (x̄ )
Age Frequency
54 3
55 1
56 1 σ𝐱
57 2 x̄ =
𝐧
58 2
60 2
54 + 54 + 54 + 55 + 56 + 57 + 57 + 58 + 58 + 60 + 60
=
11
623
= = 𝟓𝟔. 𝟔 𝐲𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐬
11
The Mean (x̄ )
Score Freq x̄ fx̄ σ 𝐟𝐱
70-74 13 72 936 x̄ =
𝐧
75-59 13 77 1001
80-84 19 82 1558 4835
=
85-89 8 87 696 60
90-94 7 92 644
= 𝟖𝟎. 𝟓𝟖
Total n=60 4835
The Median (Md)
54, 54, 54, 55, 56, 57, 57, 58, 58, 60, 60
Median is 57
52, 54, 54, 54, 55, 56, 57, 57, 58, 58, 60, 60
56+57
Median = = 𝟓𝟔. 𝟔
2
The Median (Md)
𝐧ൗ
𝐌𝐝 = 𝐋𝐦 + 𝟐 − 𝐜𝐟 𝐢
𝐟𝐦
where
𝐋𝐦 – lower boundary of median class
𝐧Τ – half the sum of the absolute freq
𝟐
cf – cumulative freq immediately above the median class
𝐟𝐦 – freq of the median class
i – class width
The Median (Md)
𝐧ൗ
𝐌𝐝 = 𝐋𝐦 + 𝟐 − 𝐜𝐟 𝐢
Score Frequency Cumulative
Frequency
𝐟𝐦
70-74 13 13 60ൗ − 26
75-59 13 26 = 79.5 + 2
80-84 19 45 19
85-89 8 53 4
90-94 7 60 = 79.5 + 5
19
Total n = 60
= 79.5 + 1
= 𝟖𝟎. 𝟓
The Mode (Mo)
54, 54, 54, 55, 56, 57, 57, 58, 58, 60, 60
Mode is 54
If all values occur only once, there would be no mode
There can be more than one mode
The Mode (Mo)
Mode for Grouped Data:
Score Frequency midpoint of the interval
70-74 13
containing the largest number of cases
75-59 13
80-84 19
85-89 8 Get the mode:
90-94 7
Interval 80-84 (with freq 19)
Total 60
Midpoint of 80-84: 82
Mode: 82
Abigail wants to know the average
length of employment at her coffee
house. She gathered the data relative to
those who left the coffee house for the Mean:
past 5 years. There were only eight
employees who left for the said period. 60 + 45 + 32 + 8 + 13 + 32 + 20 + 32
Below are the lengths of time the said
=
8
employees stayed with the coffee house: 242
= = 𝟑𝟎. 𝟐𝟓
8
Winnie Montenegro 60 months
Median:
Rodrigo Santos 45 months
8 13 20 32 32 32 45 60
Sarah Lopez 32 months
Tessa Garcia 8 months 32+32
= = 𝟑𝟐
Crescinia Cruz 13 months 2
Roberto Herrera 32 months
Mode: 32
Bernadette Lopez 20 months
Erlinda Buensuceso 32 months
Variability
Variability refers to how spread out a group of scores is
Four frequently used measures of variability:
1. Range
2. Interquartile range
3. Variance
4. Standard deviation
Range
Range is the simplest measure of variability.
It is sensitive to outliers, and should not be used
when present
Range = H – L
Interquartile Range (IQR)
IQR is a measure of variability based on dividing a
data set into quartiles
Q1 is the middle value in the first half of the rank-ordered data set
Q2 is the median value in the set
Q3 is the middle value in the second half of the rank-ordered data set
IQR = Q3 – Q1
Interquartile Range (IQR)
52, 71, 55, 75, 81, 85, 100, 89, 83, 90, 90, 99, 100
1. List in numerical order
52, 55, 71, 75, 81, 83, 85, 89, 90, 90, 99, 100, 100
2. Find the median: 85
3. Place brackets around numbers above and below median
First half Median Second half
(52,55,71,75,81,83) 85 (89,90,90,99,100,100)
Q1 = (71+75)/2 = 73 Q3 = (90+99)/2 = 94.5
4. Solve for IQR:
IQR = Q3 – Q1 = 94.5 – 73 = 21.5
Variance
Variance is a measure of how close the scores in the
data set are to the middle of the distribution
variance of a population mean is denoted by 𝜎 2
σ 𝐗𝐢𝝁
𝝈𝟐 =
𝐧
where 𝜎 2 –population variance
Xi – ith element from the population
μ – population mean
n – number of elements in the population
Variance
variance of a sample mean is denoted by s 2
σ 𝐗𝐢 − 𝐱 𝟐
𝟐
𝐬 =
𝐧 −𝟏
where s 2 – sample variance
Xi – ith element from the sample
x – sample mean
n – number of elements in the sample
Standard Deviation
Standard deviation is a measure of
how spread out numbers are
Denoted as 𝛔, it is the square root of the variance
Exercises Age Frequency
20-24 8
1. Given the group data, find the 25-29 10
mean, median and mode. 30-34 15
35-39 12
40-44 14
2. Given the following values, find the range, interquartile
range, variance, and standard deviation.
93 110 95 92 91
112 100 94 102 115
98 100 110 96 97
92 92 100 93 112
