Math Statistics: Mode, Median and Mean

In statistics, mode, median and mean are typical values to represent a pool of numerical observations. They are calculated from the pool of observations.

Mode is the most common value among the given observations. For example, a person who sells ice creams might want to know which flavour is the most popular.

Median is the middle value, dividing the number of data into 2 halves. In other words, 50% of the observations is below the median and 50% of the observations is above the median.

Mean is the average of all the values. For example, a teacher may want to know the average marks of a test in his class.

Mode

The mode of a set of observations is the value that occurs most frequently in the set.

Example:

Find the mode of the following set of scores.

14 11 15 9 11 15 11 7 13 12

Solution:

The mode is 11 because 11 occurred more times than the other numbers

If the observations are given in the form of a frequency table, the mode is the value that has the highest frequency.

Example:

Find the mode of the following set of marks.

Solution:

The marks 2 and 3 have the highest frequency. So, the modes are 2 and 3.

Note: The above example shows that a set of observations may have more than one mode.

The following video shows a fun way to learn mode, median and mean.

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