Numeracy & Quantitative Methods: Numeracy for Professional Purposes Laura Lake

Pies charts Bar charts Histograms Other types of charts: box plots stem and leaf Recap

A box and whisker plot is a way of summarising a set of data measured on an interval scale. It is the graphical representation of the range. A box plot shows the most extreme values in the data set (maximum and minimum values), the lower and upper quartiles, and the median. Shows shape of the distribution, central value, and variability. Box and whisker plots

Box plots Chart 1: Age of respondents, years q118.5 min4 median24 max47 q336.5 Minimum Maximum Q3 Q1 Median

Stem and leaf plot summarises scale data. Helps to show the major features of the data’s distribution. Stem and leaf plot is similar to a histogram sets. Shows a table and a picture of the data. Usually works better with smaller data sets. Stem and leaf plot

Exam scores out of 100 N = 25 46, 7, 8 52, 4, 5, 5, 6, 6, 7, 7, 8, 9 62, 2, 5, 5, 7, 8, 8 72, 2, 4, 7 82

Bryman, A. (2008) Social Research Methods. 3rd Ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press. David, M. and Sutton, C. (2011) Social Research : An Introduction. 2nd ed. London: Sage. References

This resource was created by the University of Plymouth, Learning from WOeRk project. This project is funded by HEFCE as part of the HEA/JISC OER release programme.Learning from WOeRk This resource is licensed under the terms of the Attribution-Non-Commercial-Share Alike 2.0 UK: England & Wales license ( The resource, where specified below, contains other 3 rd party materials under their own licenses. The licenses and attributions are outlined below: 1.The name of the University of Plymouth and its logos are unregistered trade marks of the University. The University reserves all rights to these items beyond their inclusion in these CC resources. 2.The JISC logo, the and the logo of the Higher Education Academy are licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution -non-commercial-No Derivative Works 2.0 UK England & Wales license. All reproductions must comply with the terms of that license. Author Laura Lake InstituteUniversity of Plymouth Title Numeracy & Quantitative Methods Numeracy for Professional Purposes Description Interpreting data: graphs and charts 1 Date Created May 2011 Educational Level level 4 Keywords Learning from WOeRK Work Based Learning WBL Continuous Professional Development CPD Research UKOER LFWOER Box and whisker plots, stem and leaf plots Back page originally developed by the OER phase 1 C-Change project ©University of Plymouth, 2010, some rights reserved