Count Distributions

Now we’re going to have a look at a variable when you have counted something.

This is really common in data analysis. Often, the variables that we are analysing represent counts of things, such as the number of products sold or the number of apps downloaded.

In the above example of count data, let’s take a look at some parameters:

• The data is bounded by zero: There are no negative numbers on the (x)-axis because we can’t count things in negative
• We will often find that we have many zeroes because that instance of data did not take place (for example, no downloads of an app)
• It’s normal for count distributions to have a positive skew because the occurrence of lower counts is more common than higher counts.