PSY 2106 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Unimodality, Level Of Measurement, Central Tendency
14 Nov 2018
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Document Summary
A point on the distribution referring to the area under the curve. Identifies the percentage of the scores that fall below it. Give us an idea of where the center of the distribution is. Rectangle or uniform: no mode (all scores have the same frequency) Appropriate for all scales (nominal, ordinal, interval, ratio) Ambiguous if there is more than one mode, which mode = typical values. If difference in frequency are very small, a change in one score could change the mode dramatically. Does not take the spread of scores into account. The score corresponding to the point that 50% of the scores fall below when scores are put in numerical order (50th percentile) This formula is also useful when you have a large data set (and also works for odd number sets) Does not require an interval scale; appropriate for ordinal as well as interval/ratio. Does not take spread of scores into account.
