Graphs and Charts

Read this section.

The table below includes FSM census 2000 data and student seat numbers for the national site of COM-FSM circa 2004.

State Population (2000) Fractional share of national population (relative frequency) Number of student seats held by state at the national campus Fractional share of the national campus student seats
Chuuk 53595 0.5 679 0.2
Kosrae 7686 0.07 316 0.09
Pohnpei 34486 0.32 2122 0.62
Yap 11241 0.11 287 0.08
  107008 1 3404 1

Circle or pie charts

In a circle chart the whole circle is 100% Used when data adds to a whole, e.g. state populations add to yield national population.

A pie chart of the state populations:

notes002_pie (12K)

The following table includes data from the 2010 FSM census as an update to the above data.

State Population (2010) Relative frequency
Chuuk 48651
Kosrae 6616
Pohnpei 35981
Yap 11376
Sum: 102624

Column charts

Column charts are also called bar graphs. A column chart of the student seats held by each state at the national site:

notes002_column (18K)

Pareto chart

If a column chart is sorted so that the columns are in descending order, then it is called a Pareto chart. Descending order means the largest value is on the left and the values decrease as one moves to the right. Pareto charts are useful ways to convey rank order as well as numerical data.

entrance test Pareto: COMET overall test scores

entrance test Pareto: essay test scores

entrance test Pareto: math test scores

Line graph

A line graph is a chart which plots data as a line. The horizontal axis is usually set up with equal intervals. Line graphs are not used in this course and should not be confused with xy scattergraphs.

XY Scatter graph

When you have two sets of continuous data (value versus value, no categories), use an xy graph. These will be covered in more detail in the chapter on linear regressions.


Source: Dana Lee Ling; http://www.comfsm.fm/~dleeling/statistics/text5.html
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Last modified: Wednesday, April 3, 2019, 3:58 PM