20. A study involves measuring the number of days absent from work for 216 employees of a large company during the preceding year. As part of the results, the researcher reports, “The number of days absent during the preceding year (M = 9.21; SD = 7.34) was . . . .” Explain what is written in parentheses to a person who has never had a course in statistics.
Oh, hello there! So, in that sentence, the researcher is sharing some information about the study they conducted on employee absenteeism. Let's break it down:
"M = 9.21" refers to the mean or average number of days the employees were absent from work during the preceding year. Basically, they calculated all the numbers and ended up with an average of 9.21 days.
"SD = 7.34" stands for the standard deviation, which measures how much the individual numbers vary from the mean. In simpler terms, it tells us how spread out the data is. In this case, the standard deviation is 7.34 days.
By providing these numbers, the researcher is essentially giving you an idea of what the typical absenteeism pattern is like among the employees of this large company.
In parentheses, the researcher is providing two statistical measures to summarize the data on the number of days absent from work for the employees.
The first measure, "M = 9.21," represents the mean or average number of days absent. In this case, the average number of days absent for the employees in the study is 9.21.
The second measure, "SD = 7.34," represents the standard deviation. The standard deviation is a measure of how much the values vary or spread out from the average. In this case, the standard deviation of 7.34 indicates that, on average, the number of days absent from work varies by around 7.34 days among the employees.
In statistics, researchers often summarize the data they collected using certain statistics. In this case, the researcher is reporting the results of a study that looked at the number of days employees were absent from work in the preceding year.
Inside the parentheses, you will find two specific statistical measures: "M" and "SD" which stand for Mean and Standard Deviation, respectively. The Mean (M) is a measure of the average number of days absent for the 216 employees. In this study, the mean is reported as 9.21. This means that, on average, each employee was absent for about 9.21 days during the year.
The Standard Deviation (SD) is a measure of how much the data varies or spreads out from the mean. In this study, the standard deviation is reported as 7.34. This implies that the amount of days absent varied quite a bit among the employees, with some being closer to the mean and others being further away.
By providing the mean and standard deviation, the researcher gives a summary of the average and variation in the number of days employees were absent from work.