3. Describing Data Numerically

Given a sample with a sample mean of $\overline{x}$ and a sample standard deviation of $s$, which of the following best describes the sample mean?

Which of the following is a good point estimator for the population mean?

Find the mean of the sample data below.

Geometric Mean The geometric mean is often used in business and economics for finding average rates of change, average rates of growth, or average ratios. To find the geometric mean of n values (all of which are positive), first multiply the values, then find the nth root of the product. For a 6-year period, money deposited in annual certificates of deposit had annual interest rates of 0.58%, 0.29%, 0.13%, 0.14%, 0.15%, and 0.19%. Identify the single percentage growth rate that is the same as the six consecutive growth rates by computing the geometric mean of 1.0058, 1.0029, 1.0013, 1.0014, 1.0015, and 1.0019.

Weighted Mean A student of the author earned grades of 63, 91, 88, 84, and 79 on her five regular statistics tests. She earned grades of 86 on the final exam and 90 on her class projects. Her combined homework grade was 70. The five regular tests count for 60% of the final grade, the final exam counts for 10%, the project counts for 15%, and homework counts for 15%. What is her weighted mean grade? What letter grade did she earn (A, B, C, D, or F)? Assume that a mean of 90 or above is an A, a mean of 80 to 89 is a B, and so on.

In Exercises 29–32, compute the mean of the data summarized in the frequency distribution. Also, compare the computed means to the actual means obtained by using the original list of data values, which are as follows: (29) 31.4 minutes; (Exercise 30) 140.6 minutes; (Exercise 31) 55.2 years; (Exercise 32) 240.2 seconds.

What’s Wrong? Education Week magazine published a list consisting of the mean teacher salary in each of the 50 states for a recent year. If we add the 50 means and then divide by 50, we get \$56,479. Is the value of \$56,479 the mean teacher salary for the population of all teachers in the 50 United States? Why or why not?

Degrees of Freedom Five recent U.S. presidents had a mean age of 56.2 years at the time of their inauguration. Four of these ages are 64, 46, 54, and 47.

a. Find the missing value.

Trimmed Mean Because the mean is very sensitive to extreme values, we say that it is not a resistant measure of center. By deleting some low values and high values, the trimmed mean is more resistant. To find the 10% trimmed mean for a data set, first arrange the data in order, then delete the bottom 10% of the values and delete the top 10% of the values, then calculate the mean of the remaining values. Use the axial loads (pounds) of aluminum cans listed below (from Data Set 41 “Aluminum Cans” in Appendix B) for cans that are 0.0111 in. thick. An axial load is the force at which the top of a can collapses. Identify any outliers, then compare the median, mean, 10% trimmed mean, and 20% trimmed mean.

247 260 268 273 276 279 281 283 284 285 286 288

289 291 293 295 296 299 310 504

Body Temperatures Listed below are body temperatures (°F) of adult males (based on Data Set 5 “Body Temperatures” in Appendix B).

97.6 98.2 99.6 98.7 99.4 98.2 98.0 98.6 98.6

a. Find the mean. Does the result seem reasonable?

Exercises 1–10 are based on the following sample data consisting of costs of dinner (dollars) and the amounts of tips (dollars) left by diners. The data were collected by students of the author.

Predictions Repeat the preceding exercise assuming that the linear correlation coefficient is r = 0.132.

In Exercises 5–8, use the following two control charts that result from testing batches of newly manufactured aircraft altimeters, with 100 in each batch. The original sample values are errors (in feet) obtained when the altimeters are tested in a pressure chamber that simulates an altitude of 6000 ft. The Federal Aviation Administration requires an error of no more than 40 ft at that altitude.

What is the value of x_double bar In general, how is a value of xbar found?

Quadratic Mean The quadratic mean (or root mean square, or R.M.S.) is used in physical applications, such as power distribution systems. The quadratic mean of a set of values is obtained by squaring each value, adding those squares, dividing the sum by the number of values n, and then taking the square root of that result, as indicated below:

Quadratic mean = sqrt(∑x^2/n)

Find the R.M.S. of these voltages measured from household current: 0, 60, 110, 0. How does the result compare to the mean?

Cloud Seeding The “Florida Area Cumulus Experiment” was conducted by using silver iodide to seed clouds with the objective of increasing rainfall. For the purposes of this exercise, let the daily amounts of rainfall be represented by units of rnfl. (The actual rainfall amounts are in or )

Find the value of the following statistics and include appropriate units based on rnfl as the unit of measurement.

15.53 7.27 7.45 10.39 4.70 4.50 3.44 5.70 8.24 7.30 4.05 4.46

a. mean

b. median

In Exercises 1 and 2, use the following wait times (minutes) at 10:00 AM for the Tower of Terror ride at Disney World (from Data Set 33 “Disney World Wait Times” in Appendix B).

35 35 20 50 95 75 45 50 30 35 30 30

a. Find the mean xbar.