Notice this scatter plot does not indicate a linear relationship. The points do not appear to follow a trend. In other words, there does not appear to be a relationship between the age of the student and the score on the final exam.
Example 1: Using a Scatter Plot to Investigate Cricket Chirps
The table below shows the number of cricket chirps in 15 seconds, for several different air temperatures, in degrees Fahrenheit.[1] Plot this data, and determine whether the data appears to be linearly related.
Chirps | 44 | 35 | 20.4 | 33 | 31 | 35 | 18.5 | 37 | 26 |
Temperature | 80.5 | 70.5 | 57 | 66 | 68 | 72 | 52 | 73.5 | 53 |
Solution
Plotting this data suggests that there may be a trend. We can see from the trend in the data that the number of chirps increases as the temperature increases. The trend appears to be roughly linear, though certainly not perfectly so.
- Selected data from http://classic.globe.gov/fsl/scientistsblog/2007/10/. Retrieved Aug 3, 2010 ↵