Suppose that you have two sets of data to work with. The first set is a list of all the injuries that were seen in a clinic in a month’s time. The second set contains data on the number of minutes that each patient spent in the waiting room of a doctor’s office. You can make assumptions about other information or variables that are included in each data set.
For each data set, propose your idea of how best to represent the key information. To organize your data would you choose to use a frequency table, a cumulative frequency table, or a relative frequency table? Why?
What type of graph would you use to display the organized data from each frequency distribution? What would be shown on each of the axes for each graph?
Expert Solution Preview
To represent the key information in the first data set, which consists of a list of all the injuries seen in a clinic in a month’s time, I would choose to use a frequency table. A frequency table organizes data into categories and displays the frequency or count of each category. In this case, the categories could represent different types of injuries, such as fractures, sprains, cuts, etc. The frequency table would then show the number of occurrences or the count for each type of injury.
For the graph representing the organized data from the frequency distribution, I would use a bar graph. A bar graph is a suitable choice when dealing with categorical data, as it allows for clear visual comparison between different categories. In this case, the x-axis of the graph would represent the different types of injuries, while the y-axis would represent the frequency count or number of occurrences.
In the second data set, which contains information on the number of minutes each patient spent in the waiting room of a doctor’s office, I would choose to represent the key information using a relative frequency table. A relative frequency table displays the proportion or percentage of each category out of the total. In this case, the categories could represent different time intervals, such as 0-10 minutes, 10-20 minutes, 20-30 minutes, and so on. The relative frequency table would then show the proportion or percentage of patients within each time interval.
To display the organized data from the relative frequency distribution, I would use a histogram. A histogram is a type of bar graph that represents continuous data, in this case, the time intervals. The x-axis of the histogram would represent the time intervals, while the y-axis would represent the relative frequency or percentage of patients within each interval.
By using frequency tables and the appropriate graphs, we can effectively summarize and visualize the key information from the two data sets, helping us analyze and interpret the data more easily.
