IA Which statistic to use and why in SL IA

[Abid]

Hey,

I was wondering which each statistic (mean, mode, median) shows in a graph and why each statistic is used. At the moment I am having trouble choosing which statistic to use to represent my results in a bar graph. My IA was about effect of highlighting on memory and the DV variable was the number of questions answered correctly. Should I use mean or mode?

Thanks

[blindpet]

Hey,

I was wondering which each statistic (mean, mode, median) shows in a graph and why each statistic is used. At the moment I am having trouble choosing which statistic to use to represent my results in a bar graph. My IA was about effect of highlighting on memory and the DV variable was the number of questions answered correctly. Should I use mean or mode?

Thanks

Since your DV is at the interval/ratio level the most appropriate would be the mean though you could include median and mode as well (if the data are normally distributed though mean=median=mode). Make sure you also include the standard deviation if you use the mean because without the standard deviation the mean doesn't tell you very much. You need the standard deviation to tell you about how the data are spread. Another statistic you could use would be the range (min-max of the group).