Question

question
given the following list of values, is the mean or the median likely to be a better measure of the center of the data set?
26, 27, 26, 30, 27, 31, 29, 28, 53, 29
select the correct answer below:
○ mean
○ median

Explanation:

Step1: Identify outliers

Check the data set: \(26, 27, 26, 30, 27, 31, 29, 28, 53, 29\). The value \(53\) is much larger than the other values, so it is an outlier.

Step2: Recall properties of mean and median

The mean is affected by outliers (it is pulled in the direction of the outlier), while the median is resistant to outliers (it depends on the middle value(s) of the ordered data and is not strongly affected by extreme values).

Answer:

Median