3/24/2017 Stats:MeasuresofVariation

Stats:MeasuresofVariation

Range
Therangeisthesimplestmeasureofvariationtofind.Itissimplythehighestvalueminusthelowestvalue.

RANGE=MAXIMUMMINIMUM

Sincetherangeonlyusesthelargestandsmallestvalues,itisgreatlyaffectedbyextremevalues,thatisitis
notresistanttochange.

Variance
"AverageDeviation"

Therangeonlyinvolvesthesmallestandlargestnumbers,anditwouldbedesirabletohaveastatisticwhich
involvedallofthedatavalues.

Thefirstattemptonemightmakeatthisissomethingtheymightcalltheaveragedeviationfromthemeanand
defineitas:

Theproblemisthatthissummationisalwayszero.So,theaveragedeviationwillalwaysbezero.Thatiswhy
theaveragedeviationisneverused.

PopulationVariance

So,tokeepitfrombeingzero,thedeviationfromthemeanissquaredandcalledthe"squareddeviationfromthe
mean".This"averagesquareddeviationfromthemean"iscalledthevariance.

UnbiasedEstimateofthePopulationVariance

Onewouldexpectthesamplevariancetosimplybethepopulationvariancewiththepopulationmeanreplaced
bythesamplemean.However,oneofthemajorusesofstatisticsistoestimatethecorrespondingparameter.
Thisformulahastheproblemthattheestimatedvalueisn'tthesameastheparameter.Tocounteractthis,the
sumofthesquaresofthedeviationsisdividedbyonelessthanthesamplesize.

https://people.richland.edu/james/lecture/m170/ch03var.html 1/4
3/24/2017 Stats:MeasuresofVariation

StandardDeviation
Thereisaproblemwithvariances.Recallthatthedeviationsweresquared.Thatmeansthattheunitswerealso
squared.Togettheunitsbackthesameastheoriginaldatavalues,thesquarerootmustbetaken.

Thesamplestandarddeviationisnottheunbiasedestimatorforthepopulationstandarddeviation.

Thecalculatordoesnothaveavariancekeyonit.Itdoeshaveastandarddeviationkey.Youwillhavetosquare
thestandarddeviationtofindthevariance.

SumofSquares(shortcuts)
Thesumofthesquaresofthedeviationsfromthemeansisgivenashortcutnotationandseveralalternative
formulas.

Alittlealgebraicsimplificationreturns:

What'swrongwiththefirstformula,youask?Considerthefollowingexamplethelastrowarethetotalsfor
thecolumns

1.Totalthedatavalues:23
2.Dividebythenumberofvaluestogetthemean:23/5=4.6
3.Subtractthemeanfromeachvaluetogetthenumbersinthesecondcolumn.
4.Squareeachnumberinthesecondcolumntogetthevaluesinthethirdcolumn.
5.Totalthenumbersinthethirdcolumn:5.2
6.Dividethistotalbyonelessthanthesamplesizetogetthevariance:5.2/4=1.3

4 44.6=0.6 (0.6)^2=0.36

5 54.6=0.4 (0.4)^2=0.16

3 34.6=1.6 (1.6)^2=2.56

6 64.6=1.4 (1.4)^2=1.96

5 54.6=0.4 (0.4)^2=0.16

23 0.00(Always) 5.2
https://people.richland.edu/james/lecture/m170/ch03var.html 2/4
3/24/2017 Stats:MeasuresofVariation

Nottoobad,youthink.Butthiscangetprettybadifthesamplemeandoesn'thappentobean"nice"rational
number.Thinkabouthavingameanof19/7=2.714285714285...Thosesubtractionsgetnasty,andwhenyou
squarethem,they'rereallybad.Anotherproblemwiththefirstformulaisthatitrequiresyoutoknowthemean
aheadoftime.Foracalculator,thiswouldmeanthatyouhavetosaveallofthenumbersthatwereentered.The
TI82doesthis,butmostscientificcalculatorsdon't.

Now,let'sconsidertheshortcutformula.Theonlythingsthatyouneedtofindarethesumofthevaluesandthe
sumofthevaluessquared.Thereisnosubtractionandnodecimalsorfractionsuntiltheend.Thelastrow
containsthesumsofthecolumns,justlikebefore.

1.Recordeachnumberinthefirstcolumnandthesquareofeachnumberinthesecondcolumn.
2.Totalthefirstcolumn:23
3.Totalthesecondcolumn:111
4.Computethesumofsquares:11123*23/5=111105.8=5.2
5.Dividethesumofsquaresbyonelessthanthesamplesizetogetthevariance=5.2/4=1.3

x x^2

4 16

5 25

3 9

6 36

5 25

23 111

Chebyshev'sTheorem
Theproportionofthevaluesthatfallwithinkstandarddeviationsofthemeanwillbeatleast ,wherek

isannumbergreaterthan1.

"Withinkstandarddeviations"interpretsastheinterval: to .

Chebyshev'sTheoremistrueforanysampleset,notmatterwhatthedistribution.

EmpiricalRule
Theempiricalruleisonlyvalidforbellshaped(normal)distributions.Thefollowingstatementsaretrue.

Approximately68%ofthedatavaluesfallwithinonestandarddeviationofthemean.
Approximately95%ofthedatavaluesfallwithintwostandarddeviationsofthemean.
Approximately99.7%ofthedatavaluesfallwithinthreestandarddeviationsofthemean.

Theempiricalrulewillberevisitedlaterinthechapteronnormalprobabilities.

UsingtheTI82tofindthesevalues
https://people.richland.edu/james/lecture/m170/ch03var.html 3/4
3/24/2017 Stats:MeasuresofVariation

YoumayusetheTI82tofindthemeasuresofcentraltendencyandthemeasuresofvariationusingthelist
handlingcapabilitiesofthecalculator.

TableofContents

https://people.richland.edu/james/lecture/m170/ch03var.html 4/4