Restor Dent Endod.  2024 May;49(2):e19. 10.5395/rde.2024.49.e19.

It is normal to be “not-normal”: reporting of correct descriptive statistics in dental research

• Das S

• KMID: 2556548
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.5395/rde.2024.49.e19

Figure

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  Figure 1 Histograms of normally distributed and skewed data (hypothetical data generated digitally with n = 50 each). (A) Normally distributed data and (B) skewed data.

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  Figure 2 Scatter Dot Plot showing the data dispersion in normally distributed data (blue) and skewed data (red) with the black horizontal line at the median. Note the amount of clustering of observations around the median value in the case of normally distributed data and the amount of dispersion in skewed data with an outlier (black dot).

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  Figure 3 Quantile-Quantile(Q-Q) Plot of two hypothetical data sets. (A) Normally distributed data and (B) skewed data. Note that observations lie on or around the theoretical normal line in the case of normally distributed data, while in skewed data, the observations form a curve or an “S”-shape around the theoretical normal line.

Reference

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2. Sainani KL. Dealing with non-normal data. PM R. 2012; 4:1001–1005. PMID: 23245662.

3. Madadizadeh F, Ezati Asar M, Hosseini M. Common statistical mistakes in descriptive statistics reports of normal and non-normal variables in biomedical sciences research. Iran J Public Health. 2015; 44:1557–1558. PMID: 26744717.