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BSTA100-Essentials of Statistics: Frequency Distributions and Graphs

This document provides an overview of grouped frequency distributions and related concepts from Chapter 2 of the BSTA100 Essentials of Statistics course. It discusses how to create grouped frequency distributions when data ranges are large by organizing data into classes of equal width. Characteristics of grouped distributions are that classes should be mutually exclusive, continuous, exhaustive and of equal width. An example uses temperature data from US states to demonstrate constructing a 7-class frequency distribution, including calculating class limits, tallying frequencies, determining cumulative frequencies, and finding class midpoints. Students are directed to practice problems 8 and 9 in the worksheet.

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47 views

BSTA100-Essentials of Statistics: Frequency Distributions and Graphs

This document provides an overview of grouped frequency distributions and related concepts from Chapter 2 of the BSTA100 Essentials of Statistics course. It discusses how to create grouped frequency distributions when data ranges are large by organizing data into classes of equal width. Characteristics of grouped distributions are that classes should be mutually exclusive, continuous, exhaustive and of equal width. An example uses temperature data from US states to demonstrate constructing a 7-class frequency distribution, including calculating class limits, tallying frequencies, determining cumulative frequencies, and finding class midpoints. Students are directed to practice problems 8 and 9 in the worksheet.

Uploaded by

bill hadd
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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School of Business

Department of Economics

BSTA100- Essentials of Statistics


Chapter 2 | Part 2

Frequency Distributions and Graphs

Fall 2021- 2022

BSTA100- Chapter 2
Outline
2-1 Organizing Data
⚫ Grouped Frequency Distributions
- Creating frequency distributions
- Cumulative frequencies and midpoints

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Grouped Frequency Distributions
(Quantitative Data)
⚫ When the range of the data is large, the data must be grouped into classes
that are more than one unit in width, in what is called a grouped frequency
distribution.
⚫ The lower class limit represents the smallest data value that can be included
in the class.
⚫ The upper class limit represents the largest data value that can be included
in the class.
⚫ The class width or interval is found by subtracting the lower (or upper) class
limit of one class from the lower (or upper) class limit of the next.

3
Grouped Frequency Distributions
(Quantitative Data)
Characteristics of grouped frequency distributions:
⚫ Number of classes: There should be between 5 and 20 classes.
(enough classes to present a clear description of the collected data).
⚫ The classes must be mutually exclusive (data cannot be placed into
two classes at the same time)
⚫ The classes must be continuous. Even if there are no values in a
class, the class must be included in the frequency distribution. The
only exception occurs when the class with a zero frequency is the first
or last class (can be omitted without affecting the distribution).
⚫ The classes must be exhaustive. There should be enough classes to
accommodate all the data.
⚫ The classes must be equal in width. This avoids a distorted view of
the data.

4
Example
⚫ The data represent the record high temperatures in degrees Fahrenheit (℉)
for each of the 50 states. Construct a frequency distribution using 7 classes.

Step 1: determine the classes


⚫ Find the highest value H= 134, Find the lowest value L=100.
⚫ Find the range R= 134 -100= 34
⚫ Select number of classes (usually between 5 and 20),in this example,
number of classes is given 7.
⚫ Find the class width by dividing the range by the number of classes
34
Width = = 4.9.
7
5
Example (continued)
⚫ Round the answer up to the nearest whole number if there is a remainder: 4.9
rounded up to 5. (Rounding up is different from rounding off. A number is
rounded up if there is any decimal remainder when dividing for ex. 4.1 will be
rounded up to 5 as well)
⚫ Select a starting point for the lowest class limit. This can be the minimum or
smallest data value or any convenient number less than the minimum (you can
round down to a convenient number). In this case, 100 the smallest value is
used.
⚫ Add the width to the lowest score taken as the starting point to get the lower
limit of the next class. Keep adding until there are 7 classes
[100-105[ or 100 up to 105 → means 105 excluded from this class
[105-110[ or 105 up to 110 → means 105 included in this class and 110 excluded
[110-115[, [115-120[ , [120-125[, [125-130[,
[130-135] last number is included in last class.
⚫ When selecting the limits of the first class, make sure that the minimum value
is included in the first class.
⚫ The last class in your table should include the maximum value in your data.

6
Example (continued)
Step 2: Tally the data.
Step 3: Find the numerical frequencies from the tallies.

Class Limits Tally Frequency The frequency distribution


[100 – 105 [ shows that the class [110–
[105 – 110 [ 115[ contains the largest
[110 – 115 [ number of temperatures (18)
[115 – 120 [ followed by the class [115–
[120 – 125 [ 120[ with 13 temperatures.
[125 – 130 [ Hence, most of the
[130 – 135 ] temperatures (31 is more
than 50%) fall between 110
and 120 ℉.
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Cumulative Frequencies & Class Midpoints
⚫ A cumulative frequency distribution is a distribution that shows the number
of data values less than or equal to a specific value (adding the frequencies
of the classes less than or equal to the upper class limit)
⚫ Cumulative frequencies are used to show how many data values are
accumulated up to and including a specific class.
⚫ The class midpoint divides a class into 2 equal parts. It is obtained by
adding the lower and upper limits and dividing by 2.
(𝐿𝑜𝑤𝑒𝑟 𝑙𝑖𝑚𝑖𝑡+𝑈𝑝𝑝𝑒𝑟 𝑙𝑖𝑚𝑖𝑡)
Midpoint =
2

Class Limits Frequency Cumulative F. Midpoints


[100 – 105 [ 2 =2+0 102.5
[105 – 110 [ 10 =2+8 107.5
[110 – 115 [ 28 =10+18 112.5
[115 – 120 [ 41 =28+13 117.5
[120 – 125 [ 48 =41+7 122.5
[125 – 130 [ 49 =48+1 127.5
[130 – 135 ] 50 =49+1 132.5

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Grouped Frequency Distributions-
Summary

9
For practice solve worksheet 2
problems 8 and 9

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