Practice Statistical Question in Statistics

Use these practice problems to test your method after reviewing the concept explanation and worked examples.

Quick Recap

A question that anticipates variability in answers - it can't be answered with a single number because different data points will give different responses.

'How old is my teacher?' has ONE answer - not statistical. 'How old are teachers at my school?' will have DIFFERENT answers for each teacher - that's statistical! The key: do you expect variation?

Example 1

easy
Which of the following is a statistical question? (a) How old is the headteacher? (b) How old are the students in Year 6? (c) What day is it today?

Example 2

medium
Rewrite each non-statistical question to make it statistical: (a) 'How many pages does this book have?' (b) 'What is the temperature right now?'

Example 3

medium
Classify each question as statistical or non-statistical and justify: (a) 'How many goals did our team score last match?' (b) 'How many goals do professional teams score per match on average?' (c) 'What is the most popular pet among students in our school?'

Example 4

hard
A student asks: 'Do students who eat breakfast perform better on tests?' (a) Is this a statistical question? (b) What kind of data would need to be collected? (c) What type of study would be appropriate — observational or experimental?
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