The Mean and Standard Deviation

Overview
This reading provides a quick introduction to the mean and the standard deviation, probably the two most useful descriptive statistics in psychological
research.

The Mean
The mean of set of scores (abbreviated M) is the sum of the scores divided by the number of scores. Along with the median and the mode, the mean is
just one measure of the central tendency of a set of scores, but the mean is by far the most common and the most useful.

The Standard Deviation

Although the mean tells us where the center of a set of scores is, it does not tell us how variable those scores are. For example, the scores 45, 55, 50,
53, and 47 have a mean of 50. But the scores 20, 80, 50, 38, and 62 also have a mean of 50. Note, however, that the second set of scores is much
more variable than the first set. So in addition to a measure of central tendency, we need a measure of variability.

The standard deviation (abbreviated SD) is, roughly, the average amount by which the scores in a set differ from the mean. The scores in the first set
above differ from the mean (50) by 5, 5, 0, 3, and 3. So on average, they differ from the mean by a shade over 3. The scores in the second set differ
from the mean (again 50) by 30, 30, 0, 12, and 12. So on average, they differ from the mean by about 17. The second set of scores has a greater
standard deviation, which reflects the greater variability among the scores.

Unfortunately, the standard deviation is not just the mean difference between the scores and the mean. It is just a bit more complicated. Here is how
to compute it. 1) Find the mean. 2) Subtract the mean from each score (or each score from the mean; it does not matter). 3) Square each of these
differences. (Remember that the square of a negative number is positive.) 4) Find the mean of these squared differences. 5) Find the square root of
this mean. Voila! You have the standard deviation.

For now, when you compute a standard deviation, do it using a table like the one below. Note that Xrefers to the scores in the set, which appear in the
first column. The mean of this set of scores is 6, which appears in the every row of the second column. The difference between each score and the
mean appears in the third column. The squares of each of these differences appear in the fourth column. Below the fourth column, I have computed
the mean of the squared differences and taken the square root of this mean. (Raising a number to the power is the same as taking its square root.)
So the standard deviation of this set of scores is 2.45, meaning that the scores differ from the mean of 6 by an average of about 2.45.

XM

(X M)2

+2

16

+2

+1

16

+3

+1

+2

X = 60

(X M)2 = 60

M = 60 / 10 = 6

SD2 = 60 / 10 = 6

SD = 61/2 = 2.45

The Importance of the Standard Deviation

There are a lot of reasons that it is important to consider the standard deviation of a set of scores. Probably the most important is that it gives us
interesting information about the scores that the mean alone does not give. For example, consider an exam in a research methods course. In one
section of the course, the mean score was 70 and the standard deviation was 4. This means that overall the students did OK (indicated by the mean of
70) and also that most of them tended to score pretty close to 70 (indicated by the standard deviation of 4). So most of the students did OK. In
another section of the course, the mean score was also 70 but the standard deviation was 20. Although one still might say that overall the students did
OK (indicated by the mean of 70), the high standard deviation indicates that there was a lot of variability. Some students must have scored quite low
and others must have scored quite high. So even though the means were the same, the standard deviations paint very different pictures of student
performance on these exams.

Another example: You may have heard that people who work in the field of traffic safety say that what makes a stretch of highway dangerous is not how
fast people drive, but how variable their speed is. For example, a stretch of highway on which peoples mean speed is 80 will be fairly accident free if
the standard deviation is, say, 3. This is because there is not much variability; people are all clipping along at close to the same speed. But a stretch of
highway on which peoples mean speed is 65 might be quite dangerous if the standard deviation is 12. This is because some people must be driving
considerably slower than 65 while others must be driving considerably faster. This is likely to lead to lots of braking and lane changing, which makes
accidents more likely.