Showing posts with label measures of variability. Show all posts
Showing posts with label measures of variability. Show all posts

Thursday, October 11, 2012

Variability in Math

Introduction to variability in math:

In statistics math, variability or variation is nothing but the spread in a variable. Some of the common measures of variability in statistics math are range, variation, and standard deviation. In this article variability in math , we are going to discuss about finding the measures of variability through the example problems, which will be very useful for the math students.

Measures of Variability - Range:

Definition:

Range is the difference between a greater value and a smaller value.

Steps involved to learn range:

Step 1: Arrange the given numbers from ascending to descending order.

Step 2: Identify the larger value in the set of data

Step 3: Identify the smaller value in the set of data

Step 4: We have to find the difference between larger and smaller value.

Example problems:

Example 1:

Find the range for the following set of data:

{ 13 , 14 , 15 , 16 , 17 }

Solution:

Range   =  larger value - smaller value

=  17 - 13

=  4

Example 2:

Find the range for the following set of data:

{ 8 , 14 , 24 , 34 , 45 }

Solution:

Range   =  larger value - smaller value

=  45 - 8

=  37

Measures of Variability - Variance and Standard Deviation:

Definition:

Variance is the mean of the squared deviation from its expected value. The standard deviation is the square root of its variance.

Step-by-step explanation:

Step 1: Mean:Find the average or mean value of the given data

Step 2: Variance:To find the variance, get each difference from the mean value and square the each value and finally

average the result.

Step 3: Standard deviation: Find the square root of variance to calculate the standard deviation.

Example problem:

Find the variance and standard deviation for the given set of data:

{ 2, 9, 3, 1, 5 }

Solution:

Step 1: Mean

Mean   =  ` ( 2 + 9 + 3 + 1 + 5 ) / 5`

=  ` 20 / 5`

= 4

Step 2: Variance

Variance  =   `( (5-4)^2 + (9-4)^2 + (3-4)^2 + (1-4)^2 + (5-4)^2 )/5`

=   `( (1)^2 + (5)^2 + (-1)^2 + (-3)^2 + (1)^2 )/5`

=   `(1+25+1+9 + 1)/5`

=   `37/5`

=  7.4

Step 3:Standard deviation

Standard deviation  =  `sqrt ( 7.4 )`

=  2.72