Showing posts with label frequency. Show all posts
Showing posts with label frequency. Show all posts

Sunday, February 8, 2009

Frequency and Relative frequency, (Counts and percentages)

Frequencies are probably the most popular statistics.

A frequency is nothing more than a count.
And a relative frequency is a percentage.

Thus if we have a sample of 10 marbles we may count
4 red marbles
3 green marbles
2 blue marbles
1 yellow marble

The 4,3,2,1 are their counts or frequencies and their relative frequency would be the percentage they represent of the sample of 10.

We find a percentage dividing the count by the sample size, like
4/10 = 0.4 or 40%
4/10 = 0.2 or 30%
4/10 = 0.3 or 20%
4/10 = 0.1 or 10%

Data like this is often seen in the form of a bar chart, or a pie chart and is one of the most popular ways to present data for drawing conclusions.