GED LESSON Statistics: Measures of Central Tendency, Mean, Median and Mode

FULL PURPLE MATH ARTICLE HERE

Mean, median, and mode are three kinds of "averages". There are many "averages" in statistics, but these are, I think, the three most common, and are certainly the three you are most likely to encounter in your pre-statistics courses, if the topic comes up at all.

The "mean" is the "average" you're used to, where you add up all the numbers and then divide by the number of numbers. 

The "median" is the "middle" value in the list of numbers. To find the median, your numbers have to be listed in numerical order, so you may have to rewrite your list first. 

The "mode" is the value that occurs most often. If no number is repeated, then there is no mode for the list.

Find the mean, median, mode, and range for the following list of values: 13, 18, 13, 14, 13, 16, 14, 21, 13 The mean is the usual average, so: (13 + 18 + 13 + 14 + 13 + 16 + 14 + 21 + 13) ÷ 9 = 15 Note that the mean isn't a value from the original list. This is a common result. You should not assume that your mean will be one of your original numbers. The median is the middle value, so I'll have to rewrite the list in order: 13, 13, 13, 13, 14, 14, 16, 18, 21 There are nine numbers in the list, so the middle one will be the (9 + 1) ÷ 2 = 10 ÷ 2 = 5th number: 13, 13, 13, 13, 14, 14, 16, 18, 21 So the median is 14.   Copyright © Elizabeth Stapel 2004-2011 All Rights Reserved The mode is the number that is repeated more often than any other, so 13 is the mode. The largest value in the list is 21, and the smallest is 13, so the range is 21 – 13 = 8. mean: 15 median: 14 mode: 13 range: 8