A marine biologist was interested in seeing the relationship between a manatee's weight and height. She gathered data and wanted to construct a graph to display the data in order to observe this relationship.

Question

Is a scatter plot or a line graph more appropriate to construct for the data, given the context of the problem? Explain.
A scatter plot, because it would show the association or relationship between two variables
A scatter plot, because it would show how a variable changes over time between each data point given
A line graph, because it would show the association or relationship between two variables
A line graph, because it would show how a variable changes over time between each data point given

Answer 1

In this context, the most appropriate choice is:

A scatter plot, because it would show the association or relationship between two variables.

A scatter plot is well-suited for visualizing the relationship between two continuous variables, such as a manatee's weight and height. Each point on the scatter plot represents an individual manatee, with its weight on one axis and its height on the other. This allows the marine biologist to easily see any patterns, trends, or correlations in the data.

A line graph, on the other hand, is typically used to show how a variable changes over time or in a sequence, which is not applicable in this case since we are not observing a time series or sequential data. Therefore, a scatter plot is the correct choice for displaying the relationship between the two variables in question.