TUTORIAL 3 – Descriptive Statistic: Numerical

Measures
QUESTIONS

1. Describe which measure of central tendency—mean, median, or mode—

was probably used in each situation.

a) One-half of the factory workers make more than $5.37 per hour and
one-half make less than $5.37 per hour. (Median)
b) The average number of children per family in the Plaza Heights
Complex is 1.8. (Mean)
c) Most people prefer red convertibles over any other color. (Mode)
d) The average person cuts the lawn once a week. (Mean)
e) The most common fear today is fear of speaking in public. (Mode)
f) The average age of college professors is 42.3 years. (Mean)

2. The average price of the Panther convertible is $40,000, with a standard

deviation of $4,000. The average price of the Suburban station wagon is
$20,000, with a standard deviation of $2,000. Compare the variability of the
two prices.

Mean Std Dev C.V.

Panther
Conv. $ 40,000 $ 4,000 0.10
SW $ 20,000 $ 2,000 0.10

With a standard deviation, the variability price of the Panther

convertible is greater than the variability price of the Suburban station
wagon (4000$>2000$) but with the CV, the variability price of the
Panther convertible and the variability price of the Suburban station
wagon are the same.
CONCLUSION: P has a higher absoluted variability, but both of them
have same relative variability.

MULTIPLE-CHOICE

3. Which of the following statistics is not a measure of central tendency?

A. Arithmetic mean.
B. Median.
C. Mode.
D. Q3.
4. Which measure of central tendency can be used for both numerical and
categorical variables?
A. Arithmetic mean.
B. Median.
C. Mode.
D. Geometric mean.

5. In a right-skewed distribution
A. the median equals the arithmetic mean.
B. the median is less than the arithmetic mean.
C. the median is greater than the arithmetic mean.
D. none of the above.

6. Which of the following statements about the median is NOT TRUE?

A. It is more affected by extreme values than the arithmetic
mean.
B. It is a measure of central tendency.
C. It is equal to Q2.
D. It is equal to the mode in bell-shaped "normal" distributions

7. In general, which of the following descriptive summary measures cannot

be easily approximated from a boxplot?
A. The variance.
B. The range.
C. The interquartile range.
D. The median.

8. The smaller the spread of scores around the arithmetic mean,

A. the smaller the interquartile range.
B. the smaller the standard deviation.
C. the smaller the coefficient of variation.
D. All the above.

9. In left-skewed distributions, which of the following is the correct

statement?
A. The distance from Q1 to Q2 is smaller than the distance from Q2
to Q3.
B. The distance from the smallest observation to Q1 is larger than
the distance from Q3 to the largest observation.
C. The distance from the smallest observation to Q2 is smaller than
the distance from Q2 to the largest observation.
D. The distance from Q1 to Q3 is twice the distance from the Q1 to
Q2.

10. Which of the following is NOT sensitive to extreme values?

 A. The range.
B. The standard deviation.
C. The interquartile range.
D. The coefficient of variation.

11. Which of the following is the easiest to compute?

A. The arithmetic mean.
B. The median.
C. The mode.
D. The geometric mean.

TRUE – FALSE

12. True or False: The median of the values 3.4, 4.7, 1.9, 7.6, and 6.5 is 1.9.
13. True or False: The median of the values 3.4, 4.7, 1.9, 7.6, and 6.5 is 4.05.
14. True or False: In a set of numerical data, the value for Q3 can never be
smaller than the value for Q1.
15. True or False: In a set of numerical data, the value for Q2 is always
halfway between Q1 and Q3.
16. True or False: In a boxplot, the box portion represents the data between
the first and third quartile values.
17. True or False: In a sample of size 40, the sample mean is 15. In this case,
the sum of all observations in the sample is  Xi = 600.
18. True or False: The coefficient of variation is a measure of central
tendency in the data.
19. True or False: If a set of data is perfectly symmetrical, the arithmetic
mean must be identical to the median.

PROBLEM
20. For the following sample, calculate all of descriptive statistics:
Price ($) 10 11 12 13 14
Number of 7 8 25 12 8
items

a) Size 𝑛 = 60
b) Minimum 𝑚𝑖𝑛 = 10
c) Maximum 𝑚𝑎𝑥 = 14
d) Mode 𝑚0 = 12
e) Median 𝑚𝑒 = 12
f) Mean 𝑥̅ = 12.1
g) 1st Quartile 𝑄1 = 11.5
h) 2nd Quartile 𝑄2 = 12
i) 3rd Quartile 𝑄3 = 13
j) Interquartile Range 𝐼𝑄𝑅 = 1.5
k) Range 𝑊 =4
l) Sum of Squares 𝑆𝑆 = 79,4
m) Variance 𝑠2 = 1,3457
n) Standard Deviation 𝑠 = 1,16
o) Coefficient of Variation 𝐶𝑉 = 9,587
p) The standardized value

Price ($) 10 11 12 13 14
𝑍 − 𝑠𝑐𝑜𝑟𝑒 -1,810 -0,948 -0,086 0,775 1,638