A1Side
Measures of Center and
Shapes of Distributions
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Practice Page
Directions: Read carefully and choose the best answers.
  1.  The number of snowboarding accidents reported weekly during one winter season at the Fun Mountain Resort:
     12, 15, 6, 8, 12, 17, 10, 8, 7, 13, 14, 16, 8, 18, 11 		snowboard
(a) Find the mean.
Choose:
11.7
12
12.7
12.8

(b) Find the median.
Choose:
11
12
13
14

(c) Find the mode.
Choose:
8
11
12
no mode

(d) A teenager wants to emphasize the safety of snowboarding. Which measure of central tendency should the teen use?
Choose:
mean
median
mode
  

(e) A parent wants to emphasize the dangers of snowboarding. Which measure of central tendency should the parent use?
Choose:
mean
median
mode

 

 

  2.  A company is releasing two new types of knee socks: argyle and plaid. The table below shows the sales numbers for the first week.
Day of Week
Mon
Tues
Wed
Thurs
Fri
Sat
Sun
Argyle
8
10
1
10
2
10
1
Plaid
14
6
8
6
18
12
6
kneesocks

(a) Find the mean, median and mode of the argyle knee socks sales.
Choose:
6, 8, 10
10, 8, 6
8, 6, 10
10, 6, 8

(b) Find the mean, median and mode of the plaid knee socks sales.
Choose:
6, 8, 10
10, 8, 6
8, 10, 6
10, 6, 8

(c)Which measure of central tendency would you use to show that the argyle knee socks are selling better?
Choose:
mean
median
mode
  

(d)Which measure of central tendency would you use to show that the plaid knee socks are selling better?
Choose:
mean
median
mode
  

(e)Which measure of central tendency would you use to show that there is no difference between the sales of the two types of knee socks?
Choose:
mean
median
mode

(f) Which knee socks sales had the larger spread of sales?
Choose:
argyle
plaid
both were the same

 

 

   3.  The box plot shown at the right is described as being a ____________.
Choose:
 
symmetric distribution
  skewed left distribution
  skewed right distribution
pracskew

 

 

  4.  Compare mean and median in differently shaped data distributions. For each type of distribution stated below, decide what is "typically" the relationship between the mean and the median.
Type of distribution:
mean larger
median larger
mean = median
symmetric, bell-shaped distribution
distribution skewed right
distribution skewed left
uniform distribution

 

 

   5.  The best measure of center to use when data is skewed is the ____________.
Choose:
 
mean
  median
  mode
mousemedian

 

 

  6.  Which of the following statements is false?
Choose:
 
In a skewed distribution, the mean typically gets pulled toward the tail.
  It is possible for two very different data sets to have the same mean.
  The graph clearly showing the mean value is the box plot.
  The median and the mean may be the same value in certain data sets.



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