Statistics 1 Flashcards
How is measurement defined
the assignment of numerals to objects or events according to rules
What is a variable?
A conditon in an experiment or a characteric of an entity, person, or object that can take on different categories, levels, or values and that can be quantified (measured)
What’s the Nominal scale?
- assigns names to variables based on a particular attribute
- divides data into discrete categories
- no quantative meaning
Typical ex.: Gender, marital status etc
What’s the Ordinal scale?
- has quantifiable meaning
- reports the ranking and ordering of data
- intervals between values are not assumed to be equal
Example: Likert scales
“Does the instructor show interest..”
never—seldomly—frequently–always
What’s the Interval scale?
- Has quantifiable meaning
- Intervals between values are assumed to be equal
- Zero point does not assume the absence of a value
- Values do not originate from zero
- Values cannot be expressed as multiples or fractions
Example: Temperature (Fahrenheit or Celcius)
What’s the Ratio scale?
- Has quantifiable meaning
- Intervals between values are assumed to be equal
- Zero point assumes the absence of a value
- Values originate from zero
- Values can be expressed as multiples or fractions
Typical example: Length
Which scales of measurement are parametric?
Which are non-parametric?
Nominal and ordinal data are nonparametric
Interval and ratio data are parametric
What’s a difference between DESCRIPTIVE and INFERENTIAL statistics?
Descriptive Statistics
Brief informational coefficients that summarize a given data set
* Measures of central tendency
* Measures variability
* Frequency distribution
Inferential Statistics
Allows you to draw conclusions about your data that can be applied to the wider population
E.g., t-test or ANOVA
What’s more robust to outliers, mean oder median?
Median
What is a standard deviation?
- A measure of the variability of a set of data points around the mean
- The standard deviation formula weighs unevenly spread out samples more than evenly spread samples
- The standard deviation is expressed in the same units as the original values
What’s the difference between a frequency and a probability distribution?
a Frequency distribution “only” describes the number of observations for each possible value of a variable
and a Probability distribution is an idealized frequency distribution.
it is a mathematical function that describes the probability of different possible values of a variable.