STAT 101 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: Categorical Variable, Exploratory Data Analysis
21 Nov 2017
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Document Summary
The first step in dealing with data is to organize your thinking about the data: Individual: an object described by a set of data. Quantitative variable: takes numerical values for which arithmetic operations make sense (usually recorded in a unit of measurement). Categorical variable: places individuals into one of several groups or categories. An exploratory data analysis is the process of using statistical tools and ideas to examine data in order to describe their main features. Begin by examining each variable by itself. Then move on to study the relationships among the variables. Then add numerical summaries of specific aspects of the data. Distribution of a variable: the distribution of a variable tells us what values it takes and how often it takes these values, the values of a categorical variable are labels for the categories. The distribution of a categorical variable lists the categories and gives either the count or the percent of individuals who fall in each category.
