You are responsible for planning the parking needed for a new 256-unit apartment complex, and you are told to base the needs on the statistic “average number of vehicles per household is 1.9.”

Which average (mean, median, mode) would be best if:
• You wanted to be assured that every unit would have two parking spots?

Is the distribution normal, positively skewed or negatively skewed? The average (whichever) rounds to 2.

The mean is most influenced by deviant scores, so it would be the lowest in a negatively skewed distribution, having relatively more scores above it.

The mode would be lowest in a positively skewed distribution.

The mean

If you want to be assured that every unit in the apartment complex will have two parking spots, the median would be the best average to consider.

The median is the middle value in a set of data when arranged in ascending or descending order. It is not affected by extreme values or outliers in the data set. By using the median, you can ensure that at least half of the units have two parking spots, regardless of any variations or outliers in the number of vehicles per household.

To determine the best average, we need to consider the scenario where we want to ensure that every unit has two parking spots. In this case, the median would be the most appropriate average to use.

Explanation:

The median is the middle value when the data is arranged in ascending or descending order. It represents the central tendency of a dataset, which ensures that approximately half of the values are above and half are below the median.

By using the median, we would be able to distribute the parking spaces in a way that guarantees that at least half of the households have two or more vehicles.

Here's how you can calculate the median number of vehicles per household:

1. First, sort the data in ascending or descending order. Let's say you have information on the number of vehicles for each unit.

2. Identify the middle value(s) of the dataset. If the total number of units is an even number, take the average of the two middle values.

3. The resulting median value will represent the central tendency of the dataset.

By basing the parking needs on the median rather than the mean or mode, we can ensure that every unit in the apartment complex will have at least two parking spots, considering the specific requirement.