Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Algebra 1, 2015
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Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Algebra 1, 2015 View details
1. Measures of Center and Spread
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Exercise 17 Page 312

What are the four steps when finding the standard deviation?

sqrt(140.5) ≈ 11.9

Practice makes perfect

There are four steps to follow when finding the standard deviation of a set of data.

  1. Find the mean of the data.
  2. Find the squared deviation of each data value.
  3. Find the mean of the squared deviations.
  4. Find the square root of the mean of the squared deviations.
Let's start by finding the mean, or average, of the data set from the exercise.
Mean=Sum of values/Number of values
Mean=125+136+150+119+150+143/6
Mean=823/6
Mean=137.166666...
Mean≈137.2
The mean is approximately 137.2. Now, we can find the deviation from the mean for each value and square it. Let's use a table to organize the information.
Data Value Deviation from Mean Squared Deviation
125 125-137.2= -12.2 ( -12.2)^2 = 148.84
136 136-137.2= -1.2 ( -1.2)^2=1.44
150 150-137.2= 12.8 ( 12.8)^2=163.84
119 119-137.2= -18.2 ( -18.2)^2 = 331.24
150 150-137.2= 12.8 ( 12.8)^2=163.84
143 143-137.2= 5.8 ( 5.8)^2=33.64
Next, we can find the mean of the squared deviations.
148.84+1.44+163.84+331.24+163.84+33.64/6
842.84/6
140.473333...
140.5
The final step is to find the square root of the mean of the squared deviations. sqrt(140.5) ≈ 11.9 The standard deviation of the data is approximately 11.9.