CIMA BA1 Syllabus C. Informational Context Of Business - Ogives - Notes ^{6 / 7}

Cumulative frequency distributions

Cumulative frequencies are obtained by adding the individual frequencies together.

Ogive

An ogive is a graph of the cumulative number of items with a value less than or equal to, or alternatively greater than or equal to, a certain amount.

It is drawn by plotting a diagram of a cumulative frequency distribution.

Notice:

• a frequency distribution can be graphed as a histogram

• a cumulative frequency distribution can be graphed as an ogive.

Illustration

Here, we have a number of students (Frequency) and how many hours they study per week.

See how A Cumulative frequency distribution is calculated:

The cumulative frequency distribution shows that, of the total of 33 students:

10 students study less than 1 hour per week, 
25 students study less than 3 hours per week, 
29 students study less than 4 hours per week, 
32 students study less than 6 hours per week and 
33 students study less than 10 hours per week.