Directional statistics is the subdiscipline of statistics that deals with directions (unit vectors in Rn), axes (lines through the origin in Rn) or rotations in Rn. More generally, directional statistics deals with observations on compact Riemannian manifolds.
The fact that 0 degrees and 360 degrees are identical angles, so that for example 180 degrees is not a sensible mean of 2 degrees and 358 degrees, provides one illustration that special statistical methods are required for the analysis of some types of data (in this case, angular data). Other examples of data that may be regarded as directional include statistics involving temporal periods (e.g. time of day, week, month, year, etc.), compass directions, dihedral angles in molecules, orientations, rotations and so on.
Read more about Directional Statistics: Circular and Higher Dimensional Distributions, Examples of Circular Distributions, Distributions On Higher Dimensional Manifolds, The Fundamental Difference Between Linear and Circular Statistics, Moments, Measures of Location and Spread, Distribution of The Mean, Software
Famous quotes containing the word statistics:
“July 4. Statistics show that we lose more fools on this day than in all the other days of the year put together. This proves, by the number left in stock, that one Fourth of July per year is now inadequate, the country has grown so.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)