Each kind of mean is “representative” of a different kind of data, as we’ve been seeing. Katie is quoting from Doctor Pete’s explanation at the top. Can you give me an example stating why the harmonic mean is "more representative" than the arithmetic mean? Your site talks about the mean as a "representative" value for a set of data. Some state that it is useful for speed and velocity problems. Most sites just define it or state the formula. I have searched to net to find an explanation of why anyone would use the harmonic mean. This question comes from 1996: Harmonic Mean That is, we add all the elements and then divide by the number of elements. In this case, there are 8 numbers, but we can have as many as we want. I’ll ignore the mode here, which we’ve thoroughly covered.ĭoctor Pete answered, including a bonus: "Mean" is a general term, but is most commonly used as an abbreviation for "arithmetical mean." Now, say you have a set of numbers, say, I see that the dictionary says the average is the arithmetical mean and that the geometrical mean is different, but I would like to find a simple definition comparing the meaning of theĮverything I have found is either too complex and over my head, or not complete. We’ll start with a question from 1996: Definitions: Average, Mean, Mode We’ll look here at the arithmetic, geometric, harmonic, and quadratic means, focusing on how they are the same, how they differ, and how to choose one. But just as we previously saw that there are several things called “average” (mean, median, mode), there are in fact several different kinds of “mean”. Last week, we looked at exactly what the mean is, referring specifically to the arithmetic mean, the one we first learn as the “average”.
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