1. Prepare an Excel spreadsheet containing the following for each of the variables you selected in week 2.
Column 1 – county names
Column 2 – population 2010
Columns 3 through 8 – the actual data values of your selected 6 variables for your state. Then below those data values, calculate the state\’s mean, median, mode, and sample standard deviation for your selected variables; be sure to show the formulas you used – do not simply write down that the standard deviation is 3.971. Construct a frequency table with the data summarized in classes, and use it to create a histogram for your selected variables. Note that your histogram should show your data in classes. Note that population is not one of your selected variables; do not do calculations, frequency table or histogram for population.
2. Prepare a brief Word document (but not a formal APA type paper)in which you discuss whether you think each of your 6 histograms is or is not approximately Normal Distributed. (Use the histograms you created to help with this, and see Assessing Normality, section 6.6 in the textbook for more information on normality of distribution such as skewness and looking for outliers. Do not do a Normal Quantile plot.) Why is assessing normality important?
This week you are to perform some descriptive calculations of the variables you selected in week 2. You do this in Excel, and you start by copying from the data download into a new Excel spreadsheet the data for your six variables in your selected state. You are copying the data for every county in your state. Assume your state data is a sample from the all-state data. Type headings in row 1: \”Counties\”, \”Population\”, Name of First Variable\”, etc. Suppose you have 50 counties, and you copied the first variable into the third column, so that there is data in cells C2 through C51.
Leave row 52 empty.
In cell C53 you will calculate the sample mean. Enter the formula =AVERAGE(C2.C51) and note there is a period between C2 and C51, not a comma. In cell C54 you will calculate the sample median, so enter the formula =MEDIAN(C2.C51) Continue with mode and sample standard deviation.
Note that you will probably not have 50 counties, so you will have to adjust your rows and cell numbers accordingly.
Then you create a frequency table to summarize the number of values into various classes, such as 0 – 9, 10 – 19, etc. We talked about this in chapter 2. You decide how many classes to make.
Then you use your frequency table to create a histogram to show your data in classes. We talked about this in chapter 2. Do not graph each individual data value separately.
Repeat the process for variables two through six.
