An educational psychologist measures the time taken (in seconds) by a group of school children to solve a complex puzzle. The data collected are: 12,14,15,15,16,18,19,21,8512, 14, 15, 15, 16, 18, 19, 21, 8512,14,15,15,16,18,19,21,85. Which measure of central tendency should the psychologist use to represent the typical time taken, and why?
The mean, because it is the most sensitive measure as it includes all values in the dataset.
The median, because it is unaffected by the extreme outlier of 858585 seconds.
The mode, because 151515 is the most common score and is not influenced by the highest value.
The range, because it accurately shows the overall spread from the fastest to the slowest child.
