Mode – Statistics and Probability

Mode is the figure or number which has the highest frequency. It is the number which occur most in the data.

Example1: find the mode of 4, 6, 10, 4 , 3, 11, 4

Solution:

The number which occur most in the data is 4

Mode = 4

Example 2: The score obtained by 10 students in a test were 80, 30, 50, 20, 70, 50, 30, 60, and 50. Calculate the mode.

Solution:

Arrange the number in ascending order and prepare the frequency table

The highest frequency is 3 therefore, the mode is 50

ADVANTAGES OF MODE

1. Mode is very easy to understand
2. It is easy to compute
3. Mode is not influenced by extreme values
4. It can be used for data that are not numerical
5. It is a more approximate average in circumstances where it is useful to know the most common value.

DISADVANTAGES OF MODE

1. It is not suitable for further statistical analysis
2. It is not a very good measure of a accuracy
3. It is difficult to calculate especially when more than one mode or large members are involved
4. It has limited practical use and it is not often clearly defined
5. It is not a truly representative figure because not all the values in the data are used.

ASSIGNMENT

1. The mean of ten positive members is added, the mean becomes 17. Find the eleventh number
2. Below are the scores of a group of student, in an Economics test

Scores 1 2 3 4 5

No of students 4 5 6 X 2

If the average score is 3, find the values of X

3. Obtain the median of the following numbers 3, 5, 7, 4, 1, 3, 10, 8, and 2
4. For a class of 20 students, the marks scored on an aptitude test were as follows:

4 5 9 4 4

7 8 6 7 4

6 4 7 8 6

9 4 5 5 4

Calculate the modal scores