Types of Data or Data Classification
I. Qualitative Data
A. Nominal, Attribute, or Categorical Data:
Examples:
1. Gender (female,
male)
2. Medication
(aspirin, Tylenol, Advil, none)
3. Religion
(Buddhist, Islamic, Jewish, Christian, Hindu, none, etc.)
4. Countries
(Iraq, Iran, Israel, Zimbabwe, Canada, etc.)
Descriptive Statistics used: mode (most often observed data category),
and percent. Note: averages (mean) and standard error are not appropriate!
B. Ordinal or Ranked Data: one value is greater or
less than another, but the
Magnitude of the difference
is unknown.
Examples:
1. Muscle response
(none, partial, complete)
2. Tree vigor
(Healthy, sick, dead)
3. Income (<$9,999
$10,000-$19,999, $20,000-$49,999, >$50,000)
Descriptive Statistics used: mode and percent. Note: averages (mean)
and standard error are not appropriate!
II. Quantitative or Interval Data (measurements)
A. Discrete or Meristic Data (whole number counts)
Examples:
1. Number of
petals on flower
2. Number of
pets at home
3. Number of
children in family
Descriptive Statistics used: mean, mode, median, percent.
B. Continuous measurements (rational numbers, limited
by the accuracy of your measurements)
Examples:
1. Height
2. Weight
3. Light-years
4. Blood pressure
You should be able to recognize what Data Types are used in
these graphs
.