Measure of dispersion

1 answer

A measure of dispersion, also known as a measure of variability, refers to a statistical measure that describes the spread or distribution of a set of data points. It provides an indication of how much the individual data values in a dataset differ from one another.

There are several common measures of dispersion, including:

1. Range: The range is the simplest measure of dispersion and is calculated by taking the difference between the maximum and minimum values in a dataset.

2. Variance: The variance is a more commonly used measure of dispersion. It measures the average of the squared differences between each data point and the mean of the dataset.

3. Standard Deviation: The standard deviation is the square root of the variance and is another widely used measure of dispersion. It provides a measure of the average amount by which each data point deviates from the mean.

4. Interquartile Range (IQR): The interquartile range is a measure of dispersion that is based on the quartiles of a dataset. It is calculated by taking the difference between the third quartile (Q3) and the first quartile (Q1) and provides a measure of the spread of the middle 50% of the data.

These measures of dispersion can provide valuable information about the spread of a dataset and can help in understanding the variability and range of values within the data.