Tessa is investigating the number of strawberries in a 1-pound package. She has 6 packages of strawberries and counts the number of strawberries in each package. Her results follow. {10,12,14,15,16,17} What is the mean absolute deviation of her data? (1 point) The mean absolute deviation is .

1 answer

To find the mean absolute deviation (MAD) of Tessa's data, we'll follow these steps:

  1. Calculate the Mean: Sum all the data points and divide by the number of points.

    \[ \text{Mean} = \frac{10 + 12 + 14 + 15 + 16 + 17}{6} = \frac{84}{6} = 14 \]

  2. Calculate Absolute Deviations: Find the absolute deviation of each data point from the mean.

    • |10 - 14| = 4
    • |12 - 14| = 2
    • |14 - 14| = 0
    • |15 - 14| = 1
    • |16 - 14| = 2
    • |17 - 14| = 3

    Thus, the absolute deviations are: {4, 2, 0, 1, 2, 3}

  3. Calculate the Mean Absolute Deviation: Sum the absolute deviations and divide by the number of data points.

    \[ \text{Mean Absolute Deviation} = \frac{4 + 2 + 0 + 1 + 2 + 3}{6} = \frac{12}{6} = 2 \]

Therefore, the mean absolute deviation of Tessa's data is 2.