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6.1.

Measures of Central Tendency and Dispersion

Previous Knowledge

With the inclusion of the topics of Distributions and Regression in the mathe matics syllabus it has become necessary to introduce this chapter as a sort of previous knowledge. In those topics it is assumed that the student knows fully the terms discussed in this chapter like the Mean and the Standard Deviation. The aim is just to give practice in the calculation of these terms.

6.2.

Statistical Series

An arrangement of the data in a systematic order is called a distribution or a series. If the variable (also called variate) of the series is continuous, the series is called a continuous series. Series formed by discrete variable is called a discrete series. A continuous variable is one which is capable of taking all possible values between certain limit. For example, if the height of a child is taken every week during a year there is every possibility of having all gures of height, say, between 35 cm and 50 cm like 35.1, 35.2, etc. On the other hand an example of a discrete variable is the number of workers in a factory since it can be an integer only.

6.3.

Frequency Distribution

If the data is arranged according to the magnitude or size of the variable in class-intervals with a number corresponding to each, showing the frequency of occurance of the items in the class, the series formed is called a frequency distribution. Consider the following marks secured by 50 students out of 100 marks: 12, 55, 28, 48, 72, 60, 17, 64, 78, 58, 39, 36, 92, 9, 32, 84, 73, 40, 37, 14, 54, 35, 20, 80, 19, 34, 18, 55, 50, 38, 44, 48, 62, 71, 57, 41, 65, 73, 18, 28, 39, 57, 28, 24, 70, 61, 8, 33, 64, 42. The marks given above form an ungrouped data. If the marks are arranged in ascending or descending order, we nd that there are 2 students who got 18 marks 3 students get 28 marks and so on. The numbers 2, 3, etc., are the frequencies with which the particular values of the variable (here number of marks) occur.

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The data can be arranged into the following frequency table. Marks 010 1020 2030 3040 4050 No. of students 2 6 6 8 6 Marks 5060 6070 7080 8090 90100 No. of students 7 5 6 3 1

From the above table it can be seen that the 100 marks have been divided into 10 groups called classes. In each group 10 marks have been counted so 10 is said be the class-inter val. The number of students getting marks in any group is called the frequency of that class-interval. For example the number of students getting marks equal to or more than 30 and less than 40 marks is 8 which is the frequency of the class 3040. Also 30 and 40 are the lower and the upper limits of that class. 1 _ (upper limit + lower limit). Mid-value = _ 2 In the above frequency distribution the frequencies shown against each class are those of the class only, on the other hand if the frequency shown against each class is that obtained by adding to the frequency of the class all the frequencies of the previous classes then the frequency is known as the cumulation frequency. In the above example the cumulative frequencies the respective classes are 2; (2 + 6), (2 + 6 + 6); (2 + 6 + 6 + 8) so on.

6.4.

Measures of Central Tendency

Here we are giving methods which reduce the given data to single representative gure called the measure of central tendency. The commonly used measures of central tendency are the mean, the median and the mode.

6.5.

Mean

If x1, x2,., xn be the n items then their mean (arithmetic mean) denoted by is given by

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In case the data is arranged in a frequency distribution which x1, x2, x3, .., xn are the values of the variable and f1, f2, f3,, fn are the corresponding frequencies, then the arithmetic mean is given by

Example 6.1. (a) Calculate the mean for the following: x = Age in year 13 14 15 f = No. of students 12 14 22 16 14 17 9 18 4

(b) The frequency of accidents per shift in a factory is given in following table: Accident per shift : 0 1 2 3 4 Frequency : 192 100 24 3 1 Calculate the mean number of accidents per shift.

Solution:
(a) Applying the formula, , we get

years.

(b) Apply the formula

for the mean, we get

Thus the mean number of accidents per shift is 0.503. If class-inter vals are given then x1, x2,.xn are to be taken the Mid-values of the class-inter vals. The following example will make this clear.

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Example 6.2. Calculate the mean for the following frequency distribution: Monthly wages 310320 320330 330340 340350 350360 360370 No. of workers 2 5 11 21 26 34 Monthly wages 370380 380390 390400 400410 410420 No. of workers 36 28 16 7 4

Solution:
The calculation can be shown in the following table: Midvalues (x) 315 325 335 345 355 365 375 385 395 405 415 Total No. of workers (f) 2 5 11 21 26 34 36 28 16 7 4 _____ 190 Product (fx) 630 1625 3685 7245 9230 12410 13500 10780 6320 2835 1660 ______ 69920

6.6.

Short-cut Methods

When the magnitudes of the frequencies and the variables are large, their products turn out to be large and consequently, mathematical labour in their computation becomes enormous. To reduce the labour, the following two methods prove useful. (a) Method of assumed mean. We take an arbitrary number a called the assumed mean or the provisional mean, somewhere in the middle of the highest and the lowest values of the variable

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in the given data. Shifting the origin to this point the formula can be written as

or

where di = xi a, is called the deviation of the variate x from the assumed mean a. (b) Method of step deviation. When the values of variables are given at equi-distant points or when the class intervals are of equal lengths, a further simplication in the computation of mean can be achieved by using the step deviation method. This is expressed mathematically by the formula

Where is called the step deviation; h in the case of sample data with the values of the variable at equal spacing is the difference between any two consecutive values of the variable, and in the case of frequency distribution with equal class intervals is the length of the class interval.

6.7.

Two Useful Properties of the Mean

1. The sum of the deviations of the values xi from their arithmetic mean is zero. Proof. Let x1, x2,xm be m variables. The deviation of xi from is xi - . Now

= algebraic sum of the deviations

where and

2. If x1, x2,.xm are the means of m distributions with respective frequencies N1, N2,.Nm, then the combined mean of the

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whole distribution with frequency Proof. We see that

is given by

= the sum of all the observations of the rst distribution = the sum of all the observations of the second distribution Now the sum of all observations of all the distributions

Also the sum of the number of observations

Mean of the combined distribution

Example 6.3. Solve example 16.2 applying the short-cut methods.

Solution:
Take a = 375 as the provisional mean x 315 325 335 345 355 365 375 385 395 405 415 f 2 5 11 21 26 34 36 28 16 7 4 ____ 190 d -60 -50 -40 -30 -20 -10 0 10 20 30 40 u=d/h -6 -5 -4 -3 -2 -1 0 1 2 3 4 fd -120 -250 -440 -630 -520 -340 0 280 320 210 160 ______ -1330 fu -12 -25 -44 -63 -52 -34 0 28 32 21 16 _____ -133

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(i) Method of assumed mean

= 375 7 = 368
(ii) Method of step deviation

= 368
6.8. Median

If the items of a series are arranged in ascending or descending order of magnitude, the value of the middle item is called the median . The median thus, has the same number of items above it as below it. If n is the number of items, the median the [ ] th item in case n is odd. If n is even then the average of the two middle items gives the median. In case of grouped data, the median is given by the formula i) Median (Md) where l is the lower limit of the class in which the median lies, f is the frequency of this class. c is the cumulative frequency of the class preccam median class. i is the class interval and n is the total frequency. ii) Median

= Mode + 2/3 (Mean Mode) approximately.

Example 6.4. Following are the marks of 9 students, nd the median. 34, 32, 48, 38, 24, 30, 27, 21, 35.

Solution:
The marks written in ascending order are 21, 24, 27, 30, 32, 34, 35, 38, 48. median

th

item

=5

th

item

= 32.

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Example 6.5. Calculate the median for the following frequency distribution of the number of marks obtained by 15 students. Marks 1015 1520 2025 2530 No. of students 8 11 15 16 Marks 3035 3540 4045 4550 No. of students 14 6 4 1

Solution:
The cumulative frequency table is Class 1015 1520 2025 2530 3035 3540 4045 4550 Total Here n 75 and median class, l Md Frequency 8 11 15 16 14 6 4 1 ___ 75 Cumulative frequency 8 19 34 50 64 70 74 75

= 75/2 which clearly lies in the class 2530, the = 25; i = 5; c = 34 and f = 16.
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