Introduction

A measure of central tendency is a single value that attempts to describe a set of

data by identifying the central position within that set of data. As such,
measures of central tendency are sometimes called measures of central location.
They are also classed as summary statistics. The mean (often called the average)
is most likely the measure of central tendency that you are most familiar with,
but there are others, such as the median and the mode.

The mean, median and mode are all valid measures of central tendency, but
under different conditions, some measures of central tendency become more
appropriate to use than others. In the following sections, we will look at the
mean, mode and median, and learn how to calculate them and under what
conditions they are most appropriate to be used.

Measures of central tendency provides a single value that indicates the general
magnitude of the data and this single value provides information about the
characteristics of the data by identifying the value at or near the central location
of the data (Bordens and Abbott, 2011). King and Minium (2013) described
measures of central tendency as a summary figure that helps in describing a
central location for a certain group of scores. Tate (1955, page 78) defined
measures of central tendency as “a sort of average or typical value of the items
in the series and its function is to summarise the series in terms of this average
value”. The main functions of measures of central tendency are as follows:

1) They provide a summary figure with the help of which the central location of
the whole data can be explained. When we compute an average of a certain
group we get an idea about the whole data.

2) Large amount of data can be easily reduced to a single figure. Mean, median
and mode can be computed for a large data and a single figure can be derived.

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DIFFERENT MEASURES OF CENTRAL TENDENCY

As the concept of central tendency is now clear, we will now proceed to discuss
the three measures of central tendency. The three measures of central tendency
that we will be discussing are:

1)Mean or Arithmetic mean

2) Median

3) Mode

In this section of the Unit, we will try to understand these concepts and then in
the next section we will be focusing on the properties, advantages and
limitations of each of these measures.

Mean or Arithmetic Mean

Mean for sample is denoted by symbol ‘M or x̅ (‘x-bar’)’ and mean for

population is denoted by ‘µ’ (mu). It is one of the most commonly used
measures of central tendency and is often referred to as average. It can also be
termed as one of the most sensitive measure of central tendency as all the scores
in a data are taken in to consideration when it is computed (Bordens and Abbott,
2011). Further statistical techniques can be computed based on mean, thus,
making it even more useful. Mean is a total of all the scores in data divided by
the total number of scores. For example, if there are 100 students in a class and
we want to find mean or average marks obtained by them in a psychology test,
we will add all their marks and divide by 100, (that is the number of students) to
obtain mean.

In statistics, the Arithmetic Mean (AM) or called average is the ratio of the

sum of all observations to the total number of observations. The arithmetic

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Properties of Arithmetic Mean
mean can also inform or model concepts outside of statistics. In a physical
sense, the arithmetic mean can be thought of as a centre of gravity. From the
mean of a data set, we can think of the average distance the data points are from
the mean as standard deviation. The square of standard deviation (i.e. variance)
is analogous to the moment of inertia in the physical model.
Some important properties of the arithmetic mean are as follows:

 The sum of deviations of the items from their arithmetic mean is always
zero, i.e. ∑(x – X) = 0.
  The sum of the squared deviations of the items from Arithmetic Mean
(A.M) is minimum, which is less than the sum of the squared deviations
of the items from any other values.
 If each item in the arithmetic series is substituted by the mean, then the
sum of these replacements will be equal to the sum of the specific items.

Merits of Arithmetic Mean

 The arithmetic mean is simple to understand and easy to calculate.

 It is influenced by the value of every item in the series.
  A.M is rigidly defined.
 It has the capability of further algebraic treatment.
 It is a measured value and not based on the position in the series.

Demerits of Arithmetic Mean

 It is changed by extreme items such as very small and very large items.
 It can rarely be identified by inspection.
 In some cases, A.M. does not represent the original item. For example,
the average number of patients admitted to a hospital are 10.7 per day.
 The arithmetic mean is not suitable in extremely asymmetrical
distributions.

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Median

Median is a point in any distribution below and above which lie half of the
scores. Median is also referred to as P50 (King and Minium, 2008). The symbol
for median is ‘Md’. As stated by Bordens and Abbott (2011, page 411), ‘median
is the middle score in an ordered distribution’. If we take the example discussed
earlier of the marks obtained by 100 students in a psychology test, these marks
are to be arranged in an order, either ascending or descending. The middle score
in this distribution is then identified as median. Though this would seem easy
for an odd number of scores, in case of even number of scores a certain
procedure is followed that will be discussed when we learn how to compute
median later in this unit.

Median Properties
In statistics, the properties of the median are explained in the following points.

 Median is not dependent on all the data values in a dataset.

 The median value is fixed by its position and is not reflected by the
individual value.
 The distance between the median and the rest of the values is less than the
distance from any other point.
 Every array has a single median.
 Median cannot be manipulated algebraically. It cannot be weighed and
combined.
 In a grouping procedure, the median is stable.
 Median is not applicable to qualitative data.
 The values must be grouped and ordered for computation.
 Median can be determined for ratio, interval and ordinal scale.
 Outliers and skewed data have less impact on the median.
 If the distribution is skewed, the median is a better measure when
compared to mean.

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Mode

Mode is denoted by symbol ‘Mo’. Mode is the score in a distribution that occurs
most frequently. Taking the example of the marks obtained by a group of 100
students in psychology test discussed earlier, if out of these 100 students, 10
students obtained 35 marks. 35 is thus, most frequently occurring value and will
be termed as mode. Certain distributions can be bimodal as well, where there
are two modes. For instance if there were other 10 students in this group of 100
students, who secured 47 marks, 47 is the value that is occurring as frequently
as 35 and thus, will be termed as mode along with 35. In a similar way, when
there are three modes, the term used is trimodal and when there are four or more
modes, we use the term multimodal. Though if the scores in a distribution
greatly vary then it is possible that there is no mode. Mode as such does not
provide an adequate characterisation of the distribution because it just takes in
to consideration the most frequent scores and other scores are not considered.