Kevin Bakelar

Here is a report on the amount of skittles found in snack sized packages of

skittles. For this project a sample was collected from the statistics class I am
attending. The sample was made up of a total of 32 packages. My personal bag of
candies contained 59 candies total. The purpose of this project is to show the
differences between individual packages of candies, compared to a larger sample
and attempt to draw conclusions about the overall population.

My Candies
Yellow
16

Purple

Red

12

Green

Orange

15

Green

Orange

Class Total Candies

Yellow
389

Purple
393

Red
376

370

377

These graphs show the number of candies between both myself and the class as a
whole. while in my individual package there were significant differences in the
proportions of each type of candy, the larger population seems to indicate that
they're really much more evenly distributed.
The mean number of candies per bag is 59.3 and the standard deviation is 4.69.
The five number summary is as follows:
Xmin = 36
Q1 = 59
Med. = 60
Q3 = 61.5
Xmax = 64

The distribution seems to be skewed with a longer tail on the right and the mean
closer to the left hand side. I was not expecting this because the earlier data
seemed to suggest that it might have been a normal distribution.
However these may not be the best for this kind of data because this data is largely
categorical (dependant on features of items rather than numbers) which is a good
graph to use pie charts and pareto graphs on, however frequency histograms and
boxplots are better used with quantitative data (data based on numbers rather than
characteristics). The reasons why this is the case, pie charts and pareto charts can
be used to compare multiple aspects whereas histograms and boxplots can only
take measurements of faceless data.

The purpose of a confidence interval is to show you the values where the true mean
of your population is within a certain level of certainty.

A hypothesis test is meant to compare the general thinking on something or "null

hypothesis" to some stated claim "alternative hypothesis" and see which of the two
seems to have more support from the data.

Reflection
Statistics has been an interesting course. It is both more complex and simpler
than I thought it would be. Relying more on interpretation than formulas and
equations, the latter of which I had come to expect from math classes. As for
statistics as a science I find it to be interesting though difficult to grasp at times,
however I have already found myself putting the lessons I've learned in this course
in use in my day to day life, using it to interpret polls that I see associated with a
variety of things. I have also already used it to increase my understanding of my
research for other classes which at times include statistics in explanations and I am
certain I will continue to use what I have learned in this class.