Descriptive statistics

Definition

Descriptive statistics involves summarizing and organizing data to make it easily understandable. It includes measures such as mean, median, mode, range, and standard deviation.

5 Must Know Facts For Your Next Test

1. Descriptive statistics do not involve making predictions or inferences about a population based on a sample.
2. Common graphical representations include histograms, bar charts, and box plots.
3. Measures of central tendency (mean, median, mode) describe the center of a data set.
4. Measures of variability (range, variance, standard deviation) describe the spread of data.
5. Descriptive statistics are often used as a preliminary step before conducting inferential statistics.

Review Questions

Related terms

Inferential Statistics:

A branch of statistics that makes predictions or inferences about a population based on a sample of data.

Mean:

The average value of a data set, calculated by summing all values and dividing by the number of values.

Standard Deviation:

\(\sigma\), which quantifies the amount of variation or dispersion in a set of data values.