Harmonic Mean The harmonic mean is often used as a measure of center for data sets consisting of rates of change, such as speeds. It is found by dividing the number of values n by the sum of the reciprocals of all values, expressed as n ∑ 1 x (No value can be zero.) The author drove 1163 miles to a conference in Orlando, Florida. For the trip to the conference, the author stopped overnight, and the mean speed from start to finish was 38 mi/h. For the return trip, the author stopped only for food and fuel, and the mean speed from start to finish was 56 mi/h. Find the harmonic mean of 38 mi/h and 56 mi/h to find the true “average” speed for the round trip.
Harmonic Mean The harmonic mean is often used as a measure of center for data sets consisting of rates of change, such as speeds. It is found by dividing the number of values n by the sum of the reciprocals of all values, expressed as n ∑ 1 x (No value can be zero.) The author drove 1163 miles to a conference in Orlando, Florida. For the trip to the conference, the author stopped overnight, and the mean speed from start to finish was 38 mi/h. For the return trip, the author stopped only for food and fuel, and the mean speed from start to finish was 56 mi/h. Find the harmonic mean of 38 mi/h and 56 mi/h to find the true “average” speed for the round trip.
Solution Summary: The author explains that the harmonic mean is 45.3 mi/h. The true average speed for the round trip is cHarmonicTextmean=
Harmonic Mean The harmonic mean is often used as a measure of center for data sets consisting of rates of change, such as speeds. It is found by dividing the number of values n by the sum of the reciprocals of all values, expressed as
n
∑
1
x
(No value can be zero.) The author drove 1163 miles to a conference in Orlando, Florida. For the trip to the conference, the author stopped overnight, and the mean speed from start to finish was 38 mi/h. For the return trip, the author stopped only for food and fuel, and the mean speed from start to finish was 56 mi/h. Find the harmonic mean of 38 mi/h and 56 mi/h to find the true “average” speed for the round trip.
Definition Definition Measure of central tendency that is the average of a given data set. The mean value is evaluated as the quotient of the sum of all observations by the sample size. The mean, in contrast to a median, is affected by extreme values. Very large or very small values can distract the mean from the center of the data. Arithmetic mean: The most common type of mean is the arithmetic mean. It is evaluated using the formula: μ = 1 N ∑ i = 1 N x i Other types of means are the geometric mean, logarithmic mean, and harmonic mean. Geometric mean: The nth root of the product of n observations from a data set is defined as the geometric mean of the set: G = x 1 x 2 ... x n n Logarithmic mean: The difference of the natural logarithms of the two numbers, divided by the difference between the numbers is the logarithmic mean of the two numbers. The logarithmic mean is used particularly in heat transfer and mass transfer. ln x 2 − ln x 1 x 2 − x 1 Harmonic mean: The inverse of the arithmetic mean of the inverses of all the numbers in a data set is the harmonic mean of the data. 1 1 x 1 + 1 x 2 + ...
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