True or false: why plain deviations fail

Exercise and reference answers

Questions

1. Statement is true

   Yes

   Statement

   The sum of deviations from the mean is always zero.

2. Statement is true

   Yes

   Statement

   The mean of those deviations is therefore also zero.

3. Statement is true

   No

   Statement

   Plain deviations make a good measure of dispersion.

4. Statement is true

   Yes

   Statement

   Mean deviation averages the ABSOLUTE values of the deviations.

5. Statement is true

   Yes

   Statement

   An absolute value gives the distance between two numbers on a number line.

Explanation