Appendix B - Introduction to Statistics

Question 1

Precision

Answer 1

if when the measurement is repeated they get the same answer

Question 2

accuracy

Answer 2

if the measurement is getting the correct answer

Question 3

Range

Answer 3

the difference between the lowest number and the highest number of the set

Question 4

Variance

Answer 4

how much scatter there is around the mean

Question 5

Standard Deviation

Answer 5

Square root of the variance

Question 6

Standard Error

Answer 6

a measure of how reliable the sample mean is as an approximation to the population

• how far most samples are away from the average

Question 7

test of significance

Answer 7

evaluates the probability of rejecting the null hypothesis

Question 8

Student’s t-test

Answer 8

• based on t-distribution where the mean is 0 that is the average of difference from the average of each value in the dataset
• used to reject the null hypothesis
• used for continuous data

Question 9

chi-squared test

Answer 9

• looks at frequency data
• tests the difference between observed and expected frequencies
• commonly used for data that is sorted into classes