Computing the Mode in Excel

Fundamentals of Social Statistics by Adam J. McKee

Let’s say that a researcher is interested in the most frequent political party affiliation of his survey respondents.  He has coded Democrat = 1, Republican = 2, and Independent = 3.  To find the mode, use the MODE function.

Figure 14: The Mode in Excel.
Figure 14: The Mode in Excel.

Selecting a Measure of Central Tendency

Selecting a measure of central tendency is not a difficult task if you keep the following points in mind:

-If possible, choose the mean.  This is because it is useful when paired with more advanced statistics that we will discuss in later sections.

-If the distribution is not symmetrical (is skewed by extreme scores) choose the median.

-If the data are nominal, choose the mode.

Key Terms

Measures of Central Tendency, Mean, Median, Mode

Important Symbols

Section 3.1 important symbols.

 


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Last Modified:  06/03/2021

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