Directional Data/Examples/Arbitrary Example 1
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Example of Directional Data
Consider the following set of directional data measured over the range $0 \degrees$ to $360 \degrees$:
- $\set {1 \degrees, 5 \degrees, 10 \degrees, 350 \degrees, 355 \degrees, 359 \degrees}$
If this were treated as linear data, the arithmetic mean and median are both $180 \degrees$.
However, if this directional data was measured with the same zero, but with a range from $-180 \degrees$ to $+180 \degrees$, it becomes:
- $\set {1 \degrees, 5 \degrees, 10 \degrees, -10 \degrees, -5 \degrees, -1 \degrees}$
which gives a arithmetic mean and median of $0 \degrees$.
By visual inspection, it is apparent that the second of these is a more sensible interpretation of centrality
Sources
- 2008: David Nelson: The Penguin Dictionary of Mathematics (4th ed.) ... (previous) ... (next): directional data (angular data, circular data)