Often we want to describe what the "average" person did. For this purpose the mean and median give similar results UNLESS

Question

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

When a few individuals in the sample are extreme, unlike the others, the mean can be greatly influenced by these outliers and may not accurately represent the "average" person. In such cases, the median may be a better measure of central tendency as it is not affected by extreme values. A small standard deviation or a normal distribution centered around a mean of zero would not necessarily affect the difference between the mean and median. The size of the population being studied is also not relevant in this context.

Often We Want to Describe What the "Average" Person Did