Important Characteristics of Data

• Center - The representative or average value which indicates where the middle of the data is located.

• Variation - the measure of the amount which the data values vary among themselves.

• Distribution - The nature and shape of the distribution of the data (such as uniform bell-shaped, or skewed).

• Outliers - Sample values which lie very far away from vast majority of the other sample values.

• Time - Changing the characteristics of the data over time.