FTCE Professional Education Practice Exam

Which description best fits the term 'mode' in statistics?

1. The highest score in a data set

2. The average score of a data set

3. The middle value in a data set

4. The most frequently occurring score

The correct answer is: The most frequently occurring score

The term 'mode' in statistics is defined as the most frequently occurring score in a given data set. This is an important measure of central tendency that indicates which value appears most often among the observations. The mode can be particularly useful in understanding the distribution of data, especially in cases where the data set has repeated values, as it reflects the level of popularity or commonality of particular scores. For example, in a classroom of students who received scores of 85, 90, 85, 70, and 95, the mode would be 85, since it occurs more frequently than the other scores. The presence of the mode can provide insights into trends and patterns within the data that averages and medians may not reveal, especially in non-normally distributed data or categorical data where median and mean cannot be calculated. This characteristic makes the mode a valuable statistical tool in both descriptive statistics and data analysis.