Mean, Median and Mode · Example 9

For the following situations, decide which measure(s) of centrality would be best:
(a) You found a used car that you like, and you want to know if the price is too high or too low. You find a list of sale prices for that make and model, and you see that the distribution of those prices is skewed to the right. Some of the prices at the high end are close to the original sale price of the car, so you guess that those cars might have really low mileage, or have other enhancements added on that increased the value (but which don’t apply to the car you found).
(b) You are asked to analyze the responses to a survey. One of the questions asked, “How strongly do you agree with the statement, ‘I believe my elected representatives have my best interests in mind when they vote’?” Responses are a number between 1 and 5, with 1 representing “strongly disagree” and 5 representing “strongly agree.”
(c) You are asked to find the “average” household income for a zip code. Those values are skewed right.
(d) Thinking back to the situation at the beginning of this section: you want to find “average” height. The data you’ve collected seem to be distributed symmetrically.

OpenStax, Contemporary Mathematics · §8.3 Mean, Median and Mode · Example 9