Measures of Dispersion/

Variability

Sir Jelz
Measures of Dispersion/ Variability
- Quantities that describe the spread or variability of the values
in a dataset
- Give an idea of the pattern of variation of the data values
- Large values indicate high variability or spread among the data
values.

1. Range
2. Inter-quartile Range, IQR
3. Standard deviation
4. Variance
5. Coefficient of Variation
Characteristics of a Normal Distribution
 Frequency Distribution Tables (FDT):
Terms and Definition
1. Frequency – the number of times the observation occur in the data
- the number of entries in the class
2. Frequency distribution of a variable is the pattern of frequencies of the
observation.
- a table that shows ‘classes’ or ‘intervals’ of data entries with a count of
the number of entries in each class
 Frequency tables
 Histogram
 Polygons
3. Lower class limit- lower numbers in each class
4. Upper class limit- highest numbers in each class
5. Class width- the distance between the lower limits of consecutive classes
6. Range – the difference between the max and min data entries.
 Steps in constructing FDT
1. Decide on a number of classes to use. (This number should be
between 5 and 20).
2. Find the class width. Determine the range of the data and
divide this by the number of classes. Round up to the next
number. (Note: Even if the range is a whole number, use the next number
as the class width)
3. Find the class limits.
a. Use the minimum data value as the lower limit of the first class.
b. To get the lower limit of the next class, add the class width.
c. Continue the process up to the last class.
d. Finally, find the upper limit. (Note that classes cannot be overlapping.
It’s fine to have a decimal limits.)
4. Count the number of data entries/frequency for each class,
and record on the next column for each corresponding class.
Data:
5 10 7 19 25 12 15 7 6 8

17 17 22 21 7 7 24 5 6 5

No. of classes: Range: Class width: Classes:

Classes Frequency
5-9 10
10-14 2
15-19 4
20-24 3
25-29 1
Total= 20
Classes Frequency Midp Rf Cf Class
oint boundaries
5-9 10 7 0.5 10 4.5 - 9.5
10-14 2 12 0.1 12 9.5 – 14.5
15-19 4 17 0.2 16 14.5 – 19.5
20-24 3 22 0.15 19 19.5 – 24.5
25-29 1 27 0.05 20 24.5 – 29.5