The central tendency of a distribution locates the "center" of a
distribution of values. The three major types of estimates of central tendency are the mean, the median, and the mode. The mean is the most commonly used method of describing central tendency. To compute the mean, take the sum of the values and divide by the count. For example, the mean quiz score is determined by summing all the scores and dividing by the number of students taking the exam. For example, consider the test score values !", #$, #!, %&, !", #", !" The sum of these ' values is !(', so the mean is !(')' * #$. The median is the score found at the middle of the set of values, i.e., that has as many cases +ith a larger value as have a smaller value. ,ne +ay to compute the median is to sort the values in numerical order, and then locate the value in the middle of the list. For example, if there are (-- values, the value in #"$th position is the median. .orting the / scores above produces !", !", !", #$, #!, #", #", %& There are ' scores and score 0( represents the half+ay point. The median is #$. 1f there are an even number of observations, then the median is the mean of the t+o middle scores. 1n the example, if there +ere an /th observation, +ith a value of #", the median becomes the average of the (th and "th scores, in this case #$.". The mode is the most frequently occurring value in the set. To determine the mode, compute the distribution as above. The mode is the value +ith the greatest frequency. 1n the example, the modal value !", occurs three times. 1n some distributions there is a "tie" for the highest frequency, i.e., there are multiple modal values. These are called multi2modal distributions. 3otice that the three measures typically produce different results. The term "average" obscures the difference bet+een them and is better avoided. The three values are equal if and only if the distribution is perfectly "normal" 4i.e., bell2shaped5. Dispersion 6ispersion is the spread of values around the central tendency. There are t+o common measures of dispersion, the range and the standard deviation. The range is simply the highest value minus the lo+est value. 1n our example distribution, the high value is %& and the lo+ is !", so the range is %& 7 !" * #!. The standard deviation is a more accurate and detailed estimate of dispersion because an outlier can greatly exaggerate the range 4as +as true in this example +here the single outlier value of %& stands apart from the rest of the values5. The standard deviation sho+s the relation that set of scores has to the mean of the sample. 8gain let9s take the set of scores !", #$, #!, %&, !", #", !" to compute the standard deviation, +e first find the distance bet+een each value and the mean. :e kno+ from above that the mean is #$. .o, the differences from the mean are !" 7 #$ * 7" #$ 7 #$ * 7$ #! 7 #$ * ;! %& 7 #$ * !& !" 7 #$ * 7" #" 7 #$ * ;" !" 7 #$ * 7" 3otice that values that are belo+ the mean have negative differences and values above it have positive ones. 3ext, +e square each difference 47"5 # * #" 47$5 # * $ 4;!5 # * ! 4!&5 # * #"& 47"5 # * #" 4;"5 # * #" 47"5 # * #" 3o+, +e take these "squares" and sum them to get the sum of squares 4..5 value. <ere, the sum is %"'. 3ext, +e divide this sum by the number of scores minus !. <ere, the result is %"' ) & * "-.". This value is kno+n as the variance. To get the standard deviation, +e take the square root of the variance 4remember that +e squared the deviations earlier5. This +ould be ="-." * '.'!. 8lthough this computation may seem convoluted, it9s actually quite simple. 1n >nglish, +e can describe the standard deviation as The square root of the sum of the squared deviations from the mean divided by the number of scores minus one The standard deviation allo+s us to reach some conclusions about specific scores in our distribution. 8ssuming that the distribution of scores is close to "normal", the follo+ing conclusions can be reached approximately &/? of the scores in the sample fall +ithin one standard deviation of the mean, about #)% approximately -"? of the scores in the sample fall +ithin t+o standard deviations of the mean approximately --? of the scores in the sample fall +ithin three standard deviations of the mean