In statistics, ordinal data is a statistical data type describing data consisting of numeric scores that exist on an ordinal scale, i.e. an arbitrary numeric scale where the exact numeric quantity of a particular value has no significance beyond its ability to establish a ranking over a set of data points.
A variable containing a single piece of ordinal data is known as an ordinal variable. In regression analysis, outcomes that are ordinal variables can be predicted using a variant of ordinal regression, such as ordered logit or ordered probit.
For more discussion on ordinal data, see the article on ordinal scales.
Examples of ordinal data are often found in questionnaires:
Is your general health: 1.poor 2.reasonable 3.good 4.excellent
Famous quotes containing the word data:
“Mental health data from the 1950’s on middle-aged women showed them to be a particularly distressed group, vulnerable to depression and feelings of uselessness. This isn’t surprising. If society tells you that your main role is to be attractive to men and you are getting crow’s feet, and to be a mother to children and yours are leaving home, no wonder you are distressed.”
—Grace Baruch (20th century)