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| A collection, or set, of individuals or objects or events whose properties are to be analyzed. |
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| Variable (or Response Variable) |
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| A characteristic of interest about each individual element of a population or sample. |
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| The value of the variable associated with one element of a population or sample. This value may be a number, a word, or a symbol. |
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| The set of values collected for a singular variable. These values are collected from each of the elements that belong to the sample. |
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| A planned activity whose results yield a set of data. |
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| A numerical value summarizing all the data of an entire population. Example: The average age at admission time, for all students who have ever attented a specific college. |
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| A numerical value summarizing the sample data. Example: Average height found by using a subset of 25 heights. |
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Qualitative Variable
(also called Attributive or Categorical) |
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| A variable that describes or categorizes an element of a population. Example: Level of satisfaction |
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Quantitative Variable
(also called Numerical) |
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| A variable that quantifies an element of a population. Example: How many students... |
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| A qualitative variable that describes or names an element of a population. Arithmetic opeations are meaningless on this kind of variable, and they cannot be ordered. Example: hair color |
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| A qualitative cariable that incorporates an ordered position or ranking. Example: Bed too big, bed too small, bed just right |
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| A variable which cannot have a partial value between two other values. For example, there can be 2 people or 3 people, but not 2.5 people. |
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| Can have an uncluntable number of values, including every possible value between two values. Example: weight |
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| A sampling method that produces values that systematically differ from the population being sampled. May not representative of the population. |
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| Sample selected from elements that are easily accessible. For example, interviewing voters exiting the polls, instead of going door to door with a registered voter list. |
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| Data is collected from elements of the population that volunteer. Example: satisfaction surveys |
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| Data collector does not modify the environment or control the process being observed. |
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| A list of the elements that belong to the population from which the sample will be drawn. Helps define a representative sample. |
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| Samples that are selected on the basis of being "typical." |
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| Samples in which the elements to be selected are drawn on the basis of probability. Each elemtn in a population has a certain known probability of being selected as part of the sample. |
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| A sample selected in such a way that every element in the population has an equal chance of being selected. |
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| A sample in which every nth item of the sampling frame is selected, starting from a random first element. |
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| A sample obtained by stratifying the sampling frame into subpopulations, then selecting a fixed number of items from each strata by means of a simple random sampling technique |
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| A sample obtained by stratifying the sampling frame, then selecting a number of items in proportion to the size of the strata (ex. 1 in 150) |
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| A sample obtained by sampling some, but not all of the possible subdvisions in a population. These subdivisions, or clusters, often occur naturally within the population. |
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