Describing Data:

Frequency Tables, Frequency

Distributions, and Graphic Presentation

Chapter 2 (Lecture 3)

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright © 2010 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved.
 Pie Charts and Bar Charts

BAR CHART A graph in which the classes are reported on the horizontal axis and the class
frequencies on the vertical axis. The class frequencies are proportional to the heights of the
bars.

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 Pie Chart

PIE CHART A chart that shows the proportion or

percent that each class represents of the total
number of frequencies.
Example: Ohio State Lottery Expenses in 2004
Use of Sales Amount ($ Percent of share
million)
Prizes 1,2760 59
Payments to edu 648.1 30
Bonuses 132.8 6
Operating Expenses 97.7 5
Total 2154.6 100

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 Graphic Presentation of a Frequency
Distribution

The three commonly used graphic forms are:

 Histograms
 Frequency polygons
 Cumulative frequency distributions

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 Histogram

HISTOGRAM A graph in which the classes are marked on the

horizontal axis and the class frequencies on the vertical axis. The
class frequencies are represented by the heights of the bars and
the bars are drawn adjacent to each other.

Example: For the selling prices of 80 vehicles

at Whitner Autoplex, the frequency distribution
is given as:

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 Frequency Polygon

 A frequency polygon
also shows the shape
of a distribution and is
similar to a histogram.

 It consists of line
segments connecting
the points formed by
the intersections of the
class midpoints and the
class frequencies.

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 Histogram Versus Frequency Polygon

 Both provide a quick picture of the main characteristics of the

data (highs, lows, points of concentration, etc.)
 The histogram has the advantage of depicting each class as a
rectangle, with the height of the rectangular bar representing
the number in each class.
 The frequency polygon has an advantage over the histogram. It
allows us to compare directly two or more frequency
distributions.

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 Cumulative Frequency Distribution

 A cumulative frequency polygon reports the number

and percent of observations that occur less than a
given value.
To construct a cumulative frequency distribution:
 Add the frequencies from the lowest class to the
frequency of the next highest class.
 We add this sum to the frequency of the next class,
etc.

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  To plot a cumulative frequency distribution, scale the
upper limit of each class along the X-axis and
corresponding cumulative frequencies along Y-axis

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 Example

 A sample of hourly wages of 15 employees at Home

Depot was organized into the following table
Hourly Wages ($) No. of employees
8-10 3
10-12 7
12-14 4
14-16 1
 Develop a cumulative frequency distribution and portray in a
cumulative frequency polygon?
 On the basis of cumulative frequency polygon, how many
employees earn $11 an hour or less? Half of the employees
earn an hourly wage of how much or more? Four employees
2-12 earn how much or less?