Statistics

What are the situations where you consider mean over median?

Data Scientist

Google

Dropbox

LinkedIn

Datadog

Chewy

Duolingo

Did you come across this question in an interview?

  • What are the situations where you consider mean over median?
  • Can you think of an instance where using the mean instead of the median would give you more meaningful insights?
  • When do you prefer mean over median? Can you walk me through an example?
  • Could you provide a situation where it's necessary to choose mean instead of median as the measure of central tendency?
  • Under what conditions would you select mean over median as your choice of central tendency measurement?
  • Would you mind giving me an instance in which the mean is a more suitable measure of central tendency compared to the median?
  • Are there any particular scenarios where you'd prefer mean to median? If so, could you elaborate on one of these?
  • In what scenarios would you use the mean instead of the median when analyzing data?
  • When is the mean a better choice of measurement of central tendency over the median, and why might this be applicable in certain cases?
  • In what circumstances would you opt for calculating the mean rather than the median?

Interview question asked to Data Scientists interviewing at Google, Etsy, Dropbox and others: What are the situations where you consider mean over median?.