Certificate in Business Data Analytics (CBDA) — Question 32

An analyst is looking at a particular dataset that includes the scores across all 8th grade students, across three schools. The analyst is trying to determine which type of statistics average to use to best represent the results. On looking through the dataset, the analyst has identified a few extreme outliers.
As a result, the analyst was led to use the following type of average:

Answer options

• A. Mean
• B. Range
• C. Mode
• D. Median

Correct answer: D

Explanation

The median is the most appropriate average in this scenario because it is not affected by extreme outliers, making it a better representation of the central tendency of the data. In contrast, the mean can be distorted by outliers, while the mode may not reflect the overall distribution effectively, and the range simply measures variability without indicating central tendency.