Definition:Coefficient of Variation

Definition

The coefficient of variation is a measure of dispersion for sets of data, defined as:

$C_v = \dfrac \sigma \mu \times 100 \%$

where:

$\sigma$ denotes the standard deviation

$\mu$ denotes the expectation.

Also see

• Results about the coefficient of variation can be found here.

Historical Note

The concept of the coefficient of variation was proposed by Karl Pearson as a means of comparing variability in different probability distributions.

It can be a useful coefficient, but suffers from sensitivity to changes in sample mean and so is considered crude.

Sources

• 1998: David Nelson: The Penguin Dictionary of Mathematics (2nd ed.) ... (previous) ... (next): coefficient of variation
• 1998: David Nelson: The Penguin Dictionary of Mathematics (2nd ed.) ... (previous) ... (next): variation, coefficient of
• 2008: David Nelson: The Penguin Dictionary of Mathematics (4th ed.) ... (previous) ... (next): coefficient of variation
• 2008: David Nelson: The Penguin Dictionary of Mathematics (4th ed.) ... (previous) ... (next): variation, coefficient of