Week 1: The Descriptive Stats of Outcomes - How is the Data Distributed and How can we Assess the Distribution COPY Flashcards
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What distribution is needed for parametric tests?
A normal distribution
The normal distribution curve is also referred as the
bell curve
Normal distribution is symmetrical meaning
This means that the distribution curve can be divided in the middle to produce two equal halves
The bell curve can be described using two parameters called (2)
- Mean (central tendency)
- Standard deviation (dispersion)
μ is
mean
σ is
standard deviation
Diagram shows:
e.g., If we move 1σ to the right then it contains 34.1% of the valeues
Many statistical tests (parametric) cannot be used if the data are not
normally distributed
The mean is the sum of
scores divided by the number of scores
Mean is a good measure of
central tendency for roughly symmetric distributions
The mean can be a misleading measure of central tendency in skewed distributions as
it can be greatly influenced by scores in tail e.g., extreme values
Aside from the mean, what are the 2 other measured of central tendency? - (2)
- Median
- Mode
The median is where (2)
the middle score when scores are ordered.
the middle of a distribution: half the scores are above the median and half are below the median.
The median is relatively unaffected by … and can be used with… (2)
- extreme scores or skewed distribution
- can be used with ordinal, interval and ratio data.
The mode is the most
frequently occurring score in a distribution, a score that actually occurred