week 2 activity 5 q6

[Thokchom Phalguni Singh]

can someone explain the answer?

[CG]

Week 2 Activity 5 Question 6

Statement: Mean is a measure of central tendency for a categorical variable.

Correct Answer: False. Even though the order of the data might exist in a categorical variable with an ordinal scale of measurement, the mean of the variable will not exist.

As per lecture 2.5, no meaningful arithmetic operations can be performed on nominal scale and ordinal scale categorical variables (qualitative) except counting them. Counting these categorical variables can give you the frequency distribution, mode (highest frequency) and median (midpoint of sorted ordinal observations. There is No median for nominal scale)

To calculate mean you add up observation values and divide by number of observations. Since meaningful arithmetic operations cannot be performed on nominal scale and ordinal scale, the above statement is false.

Now in the case of Rating, say 1-2-3-4-5, which is widely and normally considered to be ordinal scale, some people may go ahead and calculate the mean. However the obtained value will not be a measure of central tendency. The distance from 1 to 2 need not be the distance between 3 and 4. Even though these are numbers they are qualitative and implicitly convey and denote ordered classifications (like bad, poor, okay, good and great) which need not be equidistant.

Hope this helps.

On Tuesday, October 13, 2020 at 12:31:15 AM UTC+5:30, Thokchom Phalguni Singh wrote:

can someone explain the answer?

[Malabika Guha Mustafi]

@ CG

Exactly my doubt is same. If we get n/2 th and n/2 +1 are having two values in a ordinal scale (where the no. of observation is even and data in categorical) whether we need to considered two values as Median or considered as undefined?

[Statistics 1 Support 1]

Both the values will be median.

Thanks & Regards,
Ram,
Course Support Team