Statistics Glossary Paper

As an example:

Histogram

A histogram is a bar diagram that demonstrates how many observations fall within each category. A histogram is a plot that lets you determine, and show, the underlying frequency distribution (shape) of a set of continuous data. This allows the examination of the data for its underlying distribution or normal distribution.

Using the age group set of data below, an example histogram is provided:

36	25	38	46	55	68	72	55	36	38
67	45	22	48	91	46	52	61	58	55

To construct a histogram from a continuous variable you first need to split the data into intervals, called bins. In the table above, age has been split into bins, with each bin representing a 10-year period starting at 20 years. Each bin contains the number of occurrences of scores in the data set that are contained within that bin. For the above data set, the frequencies in each bin have been tabulated along with the scores that contributed to the frequency in each bin (see below):

Bin	Frequency	Scores Included in Bin
20-30	2	25,22
30-40	4	36,38,36,38
40-50	4	46,45,48,46
50-60	5	55,55,52,58,55
60-70	3	68,67,61
70-80	1	72
80-90	0	-
90-100	1	91

Note: Copyright 2013 Laerd statistics: https://statistics.laerd.com/statistical-guides/understanding-histograms.php

Notice that, unlike a bar chart, there are no "gaps" between the bars. This is because a histogram represents a continuous data set, and as such, there are no gaps in the data.

The creator of the Histogram was Karl Pearson. The origin is 1890 to 1895. Like the chi-square test, Pearson embraced a wide application and development of mathematical statistics. The histogram came from the Greek word “histos” (anything set upright). Pearson introduced the term histogram in 1891.

References

Frequency Histograms. (2013). Retrieved from Math is Fun Web site: http://www.mathsisfun.com/definitions/frequency-histogram.html

Histograms. (2013). Retrieved from Laerd Statistics Web site: https://statistics.laerd.com/statistical-guides/understanding-histograms.php

Histogram. (2013). Retrieved from Dictionary.com Web site: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/Histogram?s=t

Karl Pearson. (2013). Retrieved from Department of Statistical Science UCL Web site: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/statistics/department/pearson

Downing, D., & Clark, J. (2010). Business Statistics. Hauppauge, New York: Barron's.

Pearson, K. (1895). Contributions to the mathematical theory of evolution II. Royal Society of London, 186, 343-414. doi:10.1098/rsta.1895.0010