Measures of central tendency

Question 1

Evaluation of using mean as measure of central tendency

Answer 1

. Advantage ~ Sensitive and takes all values from raw scores into account
. Disadvantage ~ Unusual scores -> skewed -> give distorted impression
. Disadvantage ~ Statistic, if used inappropriately may have inapproppriate decimal places

Question 1

Measures of central tendency

Answer 1

Summarise large amounts of data into typical or average values. Usually calculated for set of scores so researchers can analyse how quantitative data scores cluster around same central value

Question 2

Evaluation of using median as central measure of tendency

Answer 2

. Advantage ~ Not affected by extreme scores and useful when data is ranked ordinal level
. Disadvantage ~ Only takes account of position of scores, not values of scores, can be misleading if used in small set of scores

Question 3

Evaluation of using mode as central measure of tendency

Answer 3

. Advantage ~ Not affected by extreme scores and only measure of central tendency that is usually appropriate to use with nominal level data
. Disadvantage ~ Tells us nothing about other scores and may be more than 1 mode

Question 4

Type 1 error

Answer 4

Rejecting null concluding IV had sign effect on DV when actually result was due to chance/other factor

Question 5

Type 2 error

Answer 5

Retain null conclude IV had no sig effect on DV when actually result was caused by IV

Question 6

Measures of dispersion

Answer 6

Show how spread out set of data is