School of Business

Department of Economics

BSTA100- Essentials of Statistics

Chapter 2 | Part 2

Frequency Distributions and Graphs

Fall 2021- 2022

BSTA100- Chapter 2
 Outline
2-1 Organizing Data
⚫ Grouped Frequency Distributions
- Creating frequency distributions
- Cumulative frequencies and midpoints

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 Grouped Frequency Distributions
(Quantitative Data)
⚫ When the range of the data is large, the data must be grouped into classes
that are more than one unit in width, in what is called a grouped frequency
distribution.
⚫ The lower class limit represents the smallest data value that can be included
in the class.
⚫ The upper class limit represents the largest data value that can be included
in the class.
⚫ The class width or interval is found by subtracting the lower (or upper) class
limit of one class from the lower (or upper) class limit of the next.

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 Grouped Frequency Distributions
(Quantitative Data)
Characteristics of grouped frequency distributions:
⚫ Number of classes: There should be between 5 and 20 classes.
(enough classes to present a clear description of the collected data).
⚫ The classes must be mutually exclusive (data cannot be placed into
two classes at the same time)
⚫ The classes must be continuous. Even if there are no values in a
class, the class must be included in the frequency distribution. The
only exception occurs when the class with a zero frequency is the first
or last class (can be omitted without affecting the distribution).
⚫ The classes must be exhaustive. There should be enough classes to
accommodate all the data.
⚫ The classes must be equal in width. This avoids a distorted view of
the data.

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 Example
⚫ The data represent the record high temperatures in degrees Fahrenheit (℉)
for each of the 50 states. Construct a frequency distribution using 7 classes.

Step 1: determine the classes

⚫ Find the highest value H= 134, Find the lowest value L=100.
⚫ Find the range R= 134 -100= 34
⚫ Select number of classes (usually between 5 and 20),in this example,
number of classes is given 7.
⚫ Find the class width by dividing the range by the number of classes
34
Width = = 4.9.
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 Example (continued)
⚫ Round the answer up to the nearest whole number if there is a remainder: 4.9
rounded up to 5. (Rounding up is different from rounding off. A number is
rounded up if there is any decimal remainder when dividing for ex. 4.1 will be
rounded up to 5 as well)
⚫ Select a starting point for the lowest class limit. This can be the minimum or
smallest data value or any convenient number less than the minimum (you can
round down to a convenient number). In this case, 100 the smallest value is
used.
⚫ Add the width to the lowest score taken as the starting point to get the lower
limit of the next class. Keep adding until there are 7 classes
[100-105[ or 100 up to 105 → means 105 excluded from this class
[105-110[ or 105 up to 110 → means 105 included in this class and 110 excluded
[110-115[, [115-120[ , [120-125[, [125-130[,
[130-135] last number is included in last class.
⚫ When selecting the limits of the first class, make sure that the minimum value
is included in the first class.
⚫ The last class in your table should include the maximum value in your data.

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 Example (continued)
Step 2: Tally the data.
Step 3: Find the numerical frequencies from the tallies.

Class Limits Tally Frequency The frequency distribution

[100 – 105 [ shows that the class [110–
[105 – 110 [ 115[ contains the largest
[110 – 115 [ number of temperatures (18)
[115 – 120 [ followed by the class [115–
[120 – 125 [ 120[ with 13 temperatures.
[125 – 130 [ Hence, most of the
[130 – 135 ] temperatures (31 is more
than 50%) fall between 110
and 120 ℉.
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 Cumulative Frequencies & Class Midpoints
⚫ A cumulative frequency distribution is a distribution that shows the number
of data values less than or equal to a specific value (adding the frequencies
of the classes less than or equal to the upper class limit)
⚫ Cumulative frequencies are used to show how many data values are
accumulated up to and including a specific class.
⚫ The class midpoint divides a class into 2 equal parts. It is obtained by
adding the lower and upper limits and dividing by 2.
(𝐿𝑜𝑤𝑒𝑟 𝑙𝑖𝑚𝑖𝑡+𝑈𝑝𝑝𝑒𝑟 𝑙𝑖𝑚𝑖𝑡)
Midpoint =
2

Class Limits Frequency Cumulative F. Midpoints

[100 – 105 [ 2 =2+0 102.5
[105 – 110 [ 10 =2+8 107.5
[110 – 115 [ 28 =10+18 112.5
[115 – 120 [ 41 =28+13 117.5
[120 – 125 [ 48 =41+7 122.5
[125 – 130 [ 49 =48+1 127.5
[130 – 135 ] 50 =49+1 132.5

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 Grouped Frequency Distributions-
Summary

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 For practice solve worksheet 2
problems 8 and 9

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