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Week 1 Interpreting Graphs

The document discusses interpreting graphs by examining the location, spread, shape, and outliers of data. It provides examples of different graph shapes such as mound-shaped, skewed, and bimodal. Outliers are defined as unusual data points that stand out. Relative frequency histograms are introduced as a way to visualize the distribution of quantitative data by dividing the range into intervals and plotting the relative frequencies. An example relative frequency histogram is provided to demonstrate how to construct and describe one based on a data set of faculty ages.

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Smita Mehta
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21 views

Week 1 Interpreting Graphs

The document discusses interpreting graphs by examining the location, spread, shape, and outliers of data. It provides examples of different graph shapes such as mound-shaped, skewed, and bimodal. Outliers are defined as unusual data points that stand out. Relative frequency histograms are introduced as a way to visualize the distribution of quantitative data by dividing the range into intervals and plotting the relative frequencies. An example relative frequency histogram is provided to demonstrate how to construct and describe one based on a data set of faculty ages.

Uploaded by

Smita Mehta
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Interpreting Graphs:

Location and Spread

Where is the data centered on the horizontal axis,


and how does it spread out from the center?

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Interpreting Graphs: Shapes

Mound shaped and symmetric


(mirror images)

Skewed right: a few unusually


large measurements

Skewed left: a few unusually


small measurements

Bimodal: two local peaks

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Interpreting Graphs: Outliers

No Outliers Outlier

Are there any strange or unusual


measurements that stand out in the data set?

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Example - Outlier

A quality control process measures the diameter of a gear


being made by a machine (cm). The technician records 15
diameters, but inadvertently makes a typing mistake on the
second entry.

1.991 1.891 1.991 1.988 1.993 1.989 1.990 1.988


1.988 1.993 1.991 1.989 1.989 1.993 1.990 1.994

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Relative Frequency Histograms
A relative frequency histogram for a quantitative data set
is a bar graph in which the height of the bar shows “how
often” (measured as a proportion or relative frequency)
measurements fall in a particular class or subinterval.

Create intervals Stack and draw bars

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Relative Frequency Histograms
 Divide the range of the data into 5-12 subintervals of
equal length.
 Calculate the approximate width of the subinterval as
Range/number of subintervals.
 Round the approximate width up to a convenient value.
 Use the method of left inclusion, including the left
endpoint, but not the right in your tally.
 Create a statistical table including the subintervals, their
frequencies and relative frequencies.

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Relative Frequency Histograms
 Draw the relative frequency histogram,plotting the
subintervals on the horizontal axis and the relative
frequencies on the vertical axis.

 The height of the bar represents


 The proportion of measurements falling in that class
or subinterval.
 The probability that a single measurement, drawn at
random from the set, will belong to that class or
subinterval.

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Example
The ages of 50 tenured faculty at a
state university.

 34 48 70 63 52 52 35 50 37 43 53 43 52 44
 42 31 36 48 43 26 58 62 49 34 48 53 39 45
 34 59 34 66 40 59 36 41 35 36 62 34 38 28
 43 50 30 43 32 44 58 53

• We choose to use 6 intervals.


• Minimum class width = (70 – 26)/6 = 7.33
• Convenient class width = 8
• Use 6 classes of length 8, starting at 25.

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Age Tally Frequency Relative Percent
Frequency
25 to < 33 1111 5 5/50 = .10 10%
33 to < 41 1111 1111 1111 14 14/50 = .28 28%
41 to < 49 1111 1111 111 13 13/50 = .26 26%
49 to < 57 1111 1111 9 9/50 = .18 18%
57 to < 65 1111 11 7 7/50 = .14 14%
65 to < 73 11 2 2/50 = .04 4%

14/50

12/50
Relative frequency

10/50

8/50

6/50

4/50

2/50

0
25 33 41 49 57 65 73
Ages

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Describing the 14/50

12/50

Distribution

Relative frequency
10/50

8/50

6/50

4/50

2/50

0
25 33 41 49 57 65 73
Ages

Shape? Skewed right


Outliers? No
What proportion of the
tenured faculty are (14 + 5)/50 = 19/50 = .38
younger than 41?
What is the probability that
a randomly selected (8 + 7 + 2)/50 = 17/50 = .34
faculty member is 49 or
older?
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