Descriptive Statistics

By WILL KENTON

Updated Jun 27, 2019

What is Descriptive Statistics?

Descriptive statistics are brief descriptive coefficients that summarize a given data set, which can be
either a representation of the entire or a sample of a population. Descriptive statistics are broken down
into measures of central tendency and measures of variability (spread). Measures of central tendency
include the mean, median, and mode, while measures of variability include the standard deviation,
variance, the minimum and maximum variables, and the kurtosis and skewness.

What is Descriptive Statistics?

Understanding Descriptive Statistics

Descriptive statistics, in short, help describe and understand the features of a specific data set by giving
short summaries about the sample and measures of the data. The most recognized types of descriptive
statistics are measures of center: the mean, median, and mode, which are used at almost all levels of
math and statistics. The mean, or the average, is calculated by adding all the figures within the data set
and then dividing by the number of figures within the set. For example, the sum of the following data
set is 20: (2, 3, 4, 5, 6). The mean is 4 (20/5). The mode of a data set is the value appearing most often,
and the median is the figure situated in the middle of the data set. It is the figure separating the higher
figures from the lower figures within a data set. However, there are less-common types of descriptive
statistics that are still very important.

People use descriptive statistics to repurpose hard-to-understand quantitative insights across a large
data set into bite-sized descriptions. A student's grade point average (GPA), for example, provides a
good understanding of descriptive statistics. The idea of a GPA is that it takes data points from a wide
range of exams, classes, and grades, and averages them together to provide a general understanding of
a student's overall academic abilities. A student's personal GPA reflects his mean academic
performance.

KEY TAKEAWAYS
Descriptive statistics summarizes or describes characteristics of a data set.

Descriptive statistics consists of two basic categories of measures: measures of central tendency and
measures of variability or spread.

Measures of central tendency describe the center of a data set.

Measures of variability or spread describe the dispersion of data within the set.

Measures of Descriptive Statistics

All descriptive statistics are either measures of central tendency or measures of variability, also known
as measures of dispersion. Measures of central tendency focus on the average or middle values of data
sets; whereas, measures of variability focus on the dispersion of data. These two measures use graphs,
tables, and general discussions to help people understand the meaning of the analyzed data.

Measures of central tendency describe the center position of a distribution for a data set. A person
analyzes the frequency of each data point in the distribution and describes it using the mean, median, or
mode, which measures the most common patterns of the analyzed data set.

Measures of variability, or the measures of spread, aid in analyzing how spread-out the distribution is
for a set of data. For example, while the measures of central tendency may give a person the average of
a data set, it does not describe how the data is distributed within the set. So, while the average of the
data may be 65 out of 100, there can still be data points at both 1 and 100. Measures of variability help
communicate this by describing the shape and spread of the data set. Range, quartiles, absolute
deviation, and variance are all examples of measures of variability. Consider the following data set: 5,
19, 24, 62, 91, 100. The range of that data set is 95, which is calculated by subtracting the lowest
number (5) in the data set from the highest (100).

Inferential Statistics: Definition, Uses

Statistics Definitions > Inferential Statistics

What is Inferential Statistics?

inferential statistics
Descriptive statistics describes data (for example, a chart or graph) and inferential statistics allows you
to make predictions (“inferences”) from that data. With inferential statistics, you take data from samples
and make generalizations about a population. For example, you might stand in a mall and ask a sample
of 100 people if they like shopping at Sears. You could make a bar chart of yes or no answers (that would
be descriptive statistics) or you could use your research (and inferential statistics) to reason that around
75-80% of the population (all shoppers in all malls) like shopping at Sears.

There are two main areas of inferential statistics:

Estimating parameters. This means taking a statistic from your sample data (for example the sample
mean) and using it to say something about a population parameter (i.e. the population mean).

Hypothesis tests. This is where you can use sample data to answer research questions. For example, you
might be interested in knowing if a new cancer drug is effective. Or if breakfast helps children perform
better in schools.

Let’s say you have some sample data about a potential new cancer drug. You could use descriptive
statistics to describe your sample, including:

Sample mean

Sample standard deviation

Making a bar chart or boxplot

Describing the shape of the sample probability distribution

dependent variable.

A bar graph is one way to summarize data in descriptive statistics. Source: NIH.GOV.
With inferential statistics you take that sample data from a small number of people and and try to
determine if the data can predict whether the drug will work for everyone (i.e. the population). There
are various ways you can do this, from calculating a z-score (z-scores are a way to show where your data
would lie in a normal distribution to post-hoc (advanced) testing.

hypothesis testing example

A hypothesis test can show where your data is placed on a distribution like this one.

Inferential statistics use statistical models to help you compare your sample data to other samples or to
previous research. Most research uses statistical models called the Generalized Linear model and
include Student’s t-tests, ANOVA (Analysis of Variance), regression analysis and various other models
that result in straight-line (“linear”) probabilities and results.

Inferential Statistics Articles

You can find hundreds of inferential statistics articles and videos on this site and on our YouTube
channel. The main indexes for inferential statistics articles are:

Binomial Theorem

Hypothesis Testing

Normal Distributions

T-Distributions

Central Limit Theorem

Confidence Intervals

Regression Analysis / Linear Regression

Comparison of Means.