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Nick Cox
Nick Cox
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'Mean ± SD' is notation. Once you define it in a manner visible to the reader, you can use it in that manner regardless of the values.

When your statistics are skewed enough that they are positive with a standard derivationdeviation larger than the mean, the question is whether describing them in terms of mean and standard derivationdeviation is really sensible because cumulants other than mean and variance will be highly relevant for the distribution, making it significantly different from a normal distribution (for which mean and variance are the only non-zero cumulants).

Chances are that the logarithm of your positive random variable is quite better approaching a normal distribution and parameterising that makes more sense.

'Mean ± SD' is notation. Once you define it in a manner visible to the reader, you can use it in that manner regardless of the values.

When your statistics are skewed enough that they are positive with a standard derivation larger than the mean, the question is whether describing them in terms of mean and standard derivation is really sensible because cumulants other than mean and variance will be highly relevant for the distribution, making it significantly different from a normal distribution (for which mean and variance are the only non-zero cumulants).

Chances are that the logarithm of your positive random variable is quite better approaching a normal distribution and parameterising that makes more sense.

'Mean ± SD' is notation. Once you define it in a manner visible to the reader, you can use it in that manner regardless of the values.

When your statistics are skewed enough that they are positive with a standard deviation larger than the mean, the question is whether describing them in terms of mean and standard deviation is really sensible because cumulants other than mean and variance will be highly relevant for the distribution, making it significantly different from a normal distribution (for which mean and variance are the only non-zero cumulants).

Chances are that the logarithm of your positive random variable is quite better approaching a normal distribution and parameterising that makes more sense.

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user387579
user387579

'Mean ± SD' is notation. Once you define it in a manner visible to the reader, you can use it in that manner regardless of the values.

When your statistics are skewed enough that they are positive with a standard derivation larger than the mean, the question is whether describing them in terms of mean and standard derivation is really sensible because cumulants other than mean and variance will be highly relevant for the distribution, making it significantly different from a normal distribution (for which mean and variance are the only non-zero cumulants).

Chances are that the logarithm of your positive random variable is quite better approaching a normal distribution and parameterising that makes more sense.