Populations and samples Flashcards
What is a population?
The whole set of items that are of interest
What is a census?
Observes or measures every member in a population
What is a sample?
A selection of observations taken from a subset of the population which is used to find out information about the population as a whole.
What is the advantage of a census?
Gives a completely accurate result.
What are the advantages of a sample?
Less time consuming and expensive.
Fewer people have to respond.
Less data to process than in a census.
What are the disadvantages of a census?
Time consuming and expensive.
Cannot be used when testing process destroys the item.
Hard to process large quantity of data.
What are the disadvantages of a sample?
The data may not be accurate.
The sample may not be large enough to give information about small sub-groups of the population.
