Mode

The most general and least precise measure of central tendency is the mode. It is the value that occurs most frequently.

To compute the mode, follow these steps.

• 1.
  List all the values in a distribution, but list each only once.
• 2.
  Tally the number of times that each value occurs.
• 3.
  The value that occurs most often is the mode.

For example, if one were to examine different styles of learning and categorize learners into Types 1, 2, and 3, the results might be as shown in Table 1.

The mode is the value that occurs most frequently, which in the above example is a Type 3 learning style.

The most commonly made mistake when computing the mode is when the number of times a category occurs is selected rather than the label of the category itself. Instead of the mode being Type 3, it is easy to conclude the mode is 110. This is because one is looking at the number of times the value occurred, and not the value that occurred most often.

Distributions of scores can have more than one mode, such as the case where two categories of events occur a similar number of times, making the set bimodal in nature.

The mode should be used when the data are categorical in nature and values can fit into only one class, such as learning style, school attended, year in school, and political affiliation.