AP PSYCHOLOGY

RESEARCH METHODS THINKING CRITICALLY WITH PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE

THE NEED FOR PSYCHOLOGICAL SCIENCE

Question [CLICK ON ANY CHOICE TO KNOW THE RIGHT ANSWER]
When should the median be used instead of the mean?
A
when there is low variability in the data
B
when there is high variability in the data
C
when scores are clustered around the mean
D
when there are no outliers around the mean
Explanation: 

Detailed explanation-1: -The median is usually preferred to other measures of central tendency when your data set is skewed (i.e., forms a skewed distribution) or you are dealing with ordinal data.

Detailed explanation-2: -The mean is used for normal number distributions, which have a low amount of outliers. The median is generally used to return the central tendency for skewed number distributions.

Detailed explanation-3: -The median is less affected by outliers and skewed data than the mean and is usually the preferred measure of central tendency when the distribution is not symmetrical.

Detailed explanation-4: -When the dataset contains an even number of values, then the median value of the dataset can be found by taking the mean of the middle two values.

Detailed explanation-5: -The median is a better measure of the central tendency of the group as It it is not skewed by exceptionally high or low characteristic values.

There is 1 question to complete.