Interpreting data: boxplots and tables - for iBooks

This unit is concerned with two main topics. In Section 1, you will learn about another kind of graphical display, the boxplot. A boxplot is a fairly simple graphic, which displays certain summary statistics of a set of data. Boxplots are particularly useful for assessing quickly the location, dispersion, and symmetry or skewness of a set of data, and for making comparisons of these features in two or more data sets. Boxplots can also be useful for drawing attention to possible outliers in a data set. The other topic, which is covered in Sections 2 and 3, is that of dealing with data presented in tabular form. You are, no doubt, familiar with such tables: they are common in the media and in reports and other documents. Yet it is not always straightforward to see at first glance just what information a table of data is providing, and it often helps to carry out certain calculations and/or to draw appropriate graphs to make this clearer. In this unit, some other kinds of data tables and some different approaches are covered. This study unit is just one of many that can be found on LearningSpace, part of OpenLearn, a collection of open educational resources from The Open University. Published in ePub 2.0.1 format, some feature such as audio, video and linked PDF are not supported by all ePub readers.