Chapter 4
Chapter 4
Measures of Dispersion
Measures of Dispersion
By comparing two different data sets (for now, measured in the same
units, e.g. kg, km etc). By chance, it may happened that the two data
sets have the same means, medians or modes.
Does it mean that the two data sets are the same or they have the same
features.
No.
here we need some extra insight into the data; as a first step, we need to
measure their respective dispersions or variabilities about the center and
then compare them.
What are Absolute Dispersion and Relative
Dispersion
Absolute & relative dispersion are two different ways to measure the
spread of a data set. They are used extensively in biological statistics, as
biological phenomena almost always show some variation and spread.
The easiest way to differentiate relative dispersion/absolute dispersion is to check
whether your statistic involves units. Absolute measures always have units, while
relative measures do not.
Most commonly used absolute measures of
dispersions
1. Range,
2. Mid-range
3. Inter-quartile Range (also called the fourth-spread),
4. Semi-inter-quartile Range( or Quartile deviation)
5. Mean Deviation
6. Variance
7. Standard Deviation
1: Range
mid-range =
mid-range =
Inter-quartile Range
The interquartile range is a measure of spread and it is denoted by Q.D. and symbolically;
Q.D. =
It is also called Semi-Inter-quartile range (SIQR) because it is just the half of IQR.
Co-efficient of Quartile Deviation
Mean (or median) deviation (MD) or mean absolute deviation (MAD) is also a
measure of dispersion defined as
the average of the absolute differences/deviations between the data values and
the data center (usually, mean or median).
Mathematically, Using the mean as the data center,
Mean deviation from mean
Since n is odd, the median is just the middle observation of the ordered data,
14 35 45 55 55 56 56 65 87 89 92
hence median is 56.
M.D. =
x : 14 35 45 55 56 65 87 89 92
f: 4 7 11 13 18 13 8 6 3
Solution: Again, first we need the mean and the median to calculate the necessary columns. The mean
is
Solution
=58.7
=56
M.D.= = = 14.2
The mean of the squared deviations of all the observations from the mean.