Q 3.39. a) Determine the mode of the dat... [FREE SOLUTION]

Chapter 3: Q 3.39. (page 103)

a) Determine the mode of the data.
b) Decide whether it would be appropriate to use either the mean or median as a measure of center. Explain your answer.
Freshmen Politics. The Higher Education Research Institute of the University of California, Los Angeles, publishes information on characteristics of incoming college freshmen in the America. Freshman. In $2000, 27.7 %$ of incoming freshmen characterized their political views as liberal. $51.9 %$ as moderate, and $20.4 %$ as conservative. For this year, a random sample of $500$ incoming college freshmen yielded the following frequency distribution for political views .

Short Answer

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a) The mode is moderate.

b) No, neither the mean nor the median should be used to determine the location of the centre.

For categorical variables, the mean or median cannot be determined. The variable "Political opinion" is categorical in this case. When the data is quantitative, the mean and median may be found. The only way to determine the centre of qualitative data (categorical) is to use the mode.

Step by step solution

Step 1. Given information.

We have given data of incoming freshmen characterized their political views as liberal.

Step 2. To find mode.

The greatest frequency is the mode of the data set.

Thus, the mode of the data set is moderate.

Step 3. Decide either the mean or median as a measure of center.

No, neither the mean nor the median should be used to determine the centre of gravity.

The reason for this is that categorical variables have no mean or median. "Political opinion" is a category variable in this case. When the data is quantitative, the mean and median can be calculated. The only measure of centre for qualitative data (categorical) is mode.