Sunday:49 Monday:55 Tuesday:52 Wednesday:46 Thursday:47 Friday:42 Saturday:38
Julia measured the high temperature in her town for one week. Using the chart above, find the mean absolute deviation for the high temperatures. Round your answer to the nearest tenth.
Be sure to show your work for finding:
the mean of the set of data
the distance of each number from the mean
the mean absolute deviation
First, we need to find the mean of the set of data:
(49+55+52+46+47+42+38) / 7 = 44.9
Next, we find the distance of each number from the mean by subtracting the mean from each number (ignoring signs):
|49-44.9| = 4.1
|55-44.9| = 10.1
|52-44.9| = 7.1
|46-44.9| = 1.1
|47-44.9| = 2.1
|42-44.9| = 2.9
|38-44.9| = 6.9
Now we find the mean of these distances to get the mean absolute deviation:
(4.1+10.1+7.1+1.1+2.1+2.9+6.9) / 7 = 4.9
Therefore, the mean absolute deviation for the high temperatures is 4.9 (rounded to the nearest tenth).