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When do you use mean or median? (S1)

When do you use mean or median? And when does it not matter?

Thanks :smile:
Reply 1
Avatar for vdub
vdub
What is the mean number of legs a person has?
Reply 2
Avatar for matt_copas
matt_copas
OP
1
vdub
What is the mean number of legs a person has?


In theory just under 2 (if you include everyone in the world)...what does this have to do with my question? or does it have something to do with whether or not you include extreme values?
Median if data is skewed, positive/negatively skewed
Mean if not skewed-symmetrical
Reply 4
Avatar for Reflexive
Reflexive
14
In that case the mode would be best. It's much more efficient to say a person has 2 legs than say 1.999. Income it is good to use the median, so extremely rich people don't give the impression that the average person earns 50k or whatever
Reply 5
Avatar for goldsilvy
goldsilvy
15
matt_copas
And when does it not matter?

Thanks :smile:

When the data is normally distributed.

Mean=median=mode.

Have a look at this,

http://uk.answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20090622061807AADuoyv

Might give you some idea when should you use what.

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