House-Sitting Puts Ink in the Travel Writers Pen

House-Sitting Puts Ink in the Travel Writers Pen Remaining for broadened extends in extraordinary and socially rich places for nothing? At that point being paid for pieces you’ve expounded on your remain? Sounds stunning, yet actually anything other than: in the course of recent years I’ve went through one-to two-month time frames in Hawaii, Mexico, Panama, the Bahamas and St. Vincent and the Grenadines with my darling Alice, without paying a penny for housing. With some cautious prep, and an open eye and psyche for stories when you arrive, you can set yourself in the mood for energizing travel-and even some green from expounding on that fervor. Finding the Opportunities For as far back as not many years,â mindmyhouse.comâ has been our home sitting site of decision. The site gives portrayals and photographs of the properties, dates and length of stays, and what the mortgage holder needs you to do in return for remaining at their home. MindMyHouse messages postings practically day by day, and they are really from everywhere throughout the world. A few proprietors need you to do things like deal with numerous Airbnbs or man of the hour their crowd of wild ox, however the greater part of them need somebody to deal with pets, water plants and keep the house secure. The Net, Cast Wide To be feasible, you must have work that permits you to go out for moderately extended lengths of time. The Internet has opened the conduits for such â€Å"solopreneurs.† Both Alice and I have been outsourcing out of our home for a considerable length of time. Obviously, house-sitting methods somebody presumably needs to deal with your home also. We have a feline who needs consideration, just as a nursery, and we’ve discovered house-sitters on MindMyHouse who have done fine employments. We composed a little manual of the characteristics of our home so that there aren’t any amazements and have ensured the bills are set up to be paid ahead of time. One sharp amazement is the point at which the Internet is patchy in the house-sit home, or more awful, out for a considerable length of time at once. That’s transpired in the Bahamas, and that didn’t help with certain cutoff times. Notwithstanding, that allows for time to take part in movement composing. Search for Angles, Before, During and After Search for story points ahead of time to check whether there’s any supervisor intrigue. I pitched tales about biking to the magma stream on the Big Island and on activities in Hilo before we invested energy there, and later had the pieces distributed in the Los Angeles Times and the San Jose Mercury News. Simultaneously, it’s keen and amusing to be available to story thoughts that harvest up. At the point when we remained in the Grenadine Islands, we discovered that there’s a rum refinery on St. Vincent and took a private visit there. Haven’t set that story yet, yet I placed a great one on searching for bourbon on an island of rum. Continuously have your camera good to go when you’re all over town, as you’re liable to discover sights for your focal points that most short-visit sightseers wouldn’t. Furthermore, I never travel without a notebook, making a point to type up my scribbled notes about individuals, spots and things inside a day or two of scribbling them, when my memory is new. Your Office Is the World Regardless of whether you need to deal with sick or mentally harmed pets (a few times for us), or a mentally harmed proprietor (once, and that was sufficient), the open doors for movement composing as a house-sitter are profound. House-sitting places you in an incredible situation to see mind blowing sights-and afterward set them on the paying page.

The Best Essay Topics of 2020

The Best Essay Topics of 2020There are a great number of essay topics that can be chosen to write an excellent essay. However, most people choose subjects that are too general to create a good essay. While it is certainly possible to write a highly specialized topic such as whether the Spanish Language is one of the major world languages or which political leaders have most influenced American History, most students prefer topics that are easier to relate to.In order to choose the essay topics for writing, there are some general rules to follow. You should look for the topics that you can easily talk about with friends, family, and co-workers. If you choose a topic that requires you to spend a lot of time writing the essay, you might have a hard time explaining it to other people because they might not understand your ideas.A thesis topic is one that has specific rules that must be followed by all writing students. It has to be based on something that can be discussed by you and a fr iend and written out in a very detailed fashion. Also, your thesis must contain all the necessary information and facts that you will use to defend yourself against your professors' criticism.In addition to the thesis, many students want to show that they have original ideas and research when they write an essay. It is difficult to have many people agree on the type of essay topic that you should write, so most people choose to write about their own experiences. Sometimes, you can make a topic that fits both situations if you select several different topics that are related to one another.The most basic rule for making a topic that can be used by anyone who is in college is to write a simple question. Most people need an essay to become better at a subject, so try to ask yourself what is it that you know that could help someone who is not as good at the subject to understand it. Also, ask yourself what is the general knowledge that everyone knows that is relevant to the topic.If you are writing an essay, it is important to research the topic that you choose. In most cases, students would prefer to select topics that will give them the information they need. It is a good idea to look at popular essay topics that have been posted online.If you use your imagination, you can find a generic topic that you can write on. However, unless you know how to write a research paper, you may need to select a topic that you really care about.

The Empowerment Of The Nursing Profession Essay - 2214 Words

Empowerment in Nursing History Arrin Padilla-Geiser Chamberlain College of Nursing NR 501 Introduction: Nightingale in History Florence Nightingale was considered a trailblazer within the nursing profession. Her understanding of what was needed to help heal a patient, was at the forefront of the nursing profession. Her ideals and implementation of these ideals were what helped to forge evidence based practice (EBP), the healing environment and what helped her advance as a nurse, even before the nursing profession was considered a profession. Smith Parker (2014) state this of Nightingale, â€Å"She defined nursing as putting the person in the best condition for nature to act, insisting that the focus of nursing was on health and the natural healing process, not on disease and reparation,† (Smith Parker, 2015, p. 4). In looking at what Nightingale has contributed to the nursing profession, her use of empowerment during her time helped to establish her role within the nursing profession. Page Czuba (1999) define empowerment as â€Å"a process that challenges our assumptions about the way things are and can be. It challenges our basic assumptions about power, helping, achieving, and succeeding,† (Page Czuba, 1999). Her ability to recognize what was needed to help her patients was what helped to establish her leadership role during the Crimean war and throughout her nursing profession. Daly (2014), has this to say about Nightingale, â€Å"Miss Nightingale was interestedShow MoreRelatedPsychological Empowerment, Emotional Intelligence And Professional Behavior Among Nurses Interns1371 Words   |  6 PagesPsychological Empowerment, Emotional Intelligence and Professional Behavior among Nurses Interns Hind Abdullah Mohamed (1) Amal Sobhy Mahmoud (2) Salwa Ahmed (3) (1) Lecturer of Nursing Administration, Faculty of Nursing, Port Said University. Egypt. (2) Assistant Prof. Psychiatric and Mental Health Nursing Faculty of Nursing, Port Said University Egypt (3) Lecturer Nursing Administration, Faculty of Nursing, Beni Suif University. Egypt. Correspondence Auther: Salwa Ahmed FacultyRead More Nurse Empowerment Essay1660 Words   |  7 Pagescare patients and shortages of nurses to meet demands of patient care (Ning, Zhong, Libo, and Qiujie, 2009). Therefore, it is important to maintain good working environments for nurses. Empowerment is seen as an effective method to advance nurse’s satisfaction (Ning, Zhong, Libo, and Qiujie, 2009). Empowerment as stated by Wittmann-Price (2004), is â€Å"the process of reaching a more positive state of being, a state of relative freedom in choice by first acknowledging an affective experience of oppression†Read MoreNursing Nurses Perceptions Of Motivators And Barriers For Obtaining The Certified Clinical Transplant Nurse ( Cctn ) Certification1540 Words   |  7 PagesSpecialized nursing care is necessary as patients’ conditions, due to co-morbidities, become more complex. An initiative to encourage registered nurses (RNs) to pursue certifications in their specialty is becoming apparent. Many l iteratures have evidence supporting the positive impact of national certifications to the professional growth of nurses. Despite foreseeable barriers, many nurses find national certifications valuable to their practice. The purpose of this paper is to explore the transplantRead MoreIntegrity and Leadership in Nursing1443 Words   |  6 PagesIntegrity and Leadership in Nursing Integrity and Leadership in Nursing Integrity is a deeply individualized phenomenon. It is the correlation between a person’s actions and their beliefs, principles, or convictions. Additionally, integrity correlates an individual’s actions and their self-understanding. When an individual identifies himself or herself as a nurse, there are often underlying personal characteristics that accompany. For example, most nurses identify themselves as caringRead MoreLeadership : A Nurse Manager Of The Telemetry Floor At The Hospital1413 Words   |  6 PagesIntroduction Leadership is an important part of almost all profession. It is no surprise that the role of nursing profession evolving, with that evolution, leadership is becoming more and more important. Leadership establishes an environment that foster personal and professional growth. Nursing is a profession that put huge emphasis on leadership skills. Leadership is such an essential part of our health care system, which can greatly impact the quality, accessibility and affordability of healthRead MoreNice Girls And Transformational Leadership Theory1633 Words   |  7 PagesStill Don’t Get the Corner Office (Nice Girls). These mistakes also precisely represent actions that may hinder a nursing manager, especially a woman, from becoming a transformational leader. This paper will examine Frankel’s approach to women in the workplace and how it relates to transformational leadership theory, touching on the theory’s background and major concepts, functions in nursing practice , applicability to personal practice, and personal growth. Background and Concepts Though not directlyRead MoreRecruitment And Retention Of Nurses1404 Words   |  6 PagesRetention in Nursing As the forthcoming nursing shortage threatens the United States, organizations must be knowledgeable in the recruitment and retention of nurses. The challenge facing health care organizations will be to retain sufficient numbers of nurses to provide safe, efficient, quality of care to patients. Also, organizations will look to recruit and attract quality nurses to fill vacancies left open by staff who left the profession due to burning out. Turnover in Nursing is a recurringRead MoreDefinition of Nursing1191 Words   |  5 Pagesstipulated. Gastmans (1998) states, â€Å"For nurses (both as individuals and as a professional group) it should be considered an ethical challenge to change the context of nursing practice from a stumbling block into a driving force† (p. 244). Creating a new identity ensures professional recognition and the appreciation of nursing competence and commitment to the patient’s well being (Gastmans, 1998). Description of Terms Health Health can be described as the absence of physical disease or painRead MoreHealthcare Teams Essay1260 Words   |  6 PagesHealthcare Teams Paper â€Å"All health care disciplines share a common and primary commitment to serving the patient and working toward the ideal of health for all.† (American Association of Colleges of Nursing, 2014, p. 1) There are many different professional members in the healthcare system. Each of them, have a specific specialty and responsibility to the patient and play an important role in the patient’s overall plan of care. â€Å"The scope of health care mandates that health professionals work collaborativelyRead MoreNursing Leadership For Sustainable Community Health And Development Essay1104 Words   |  5 PagesSTRENGHTENING NURSING LEADERSHIP FOR SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITY HEALTH AND DEVELOPMENT IN WEST NILE SUB REGION Building Essential Effective Nursing Leadership Beyond 2020 Aserua Rosemary November 2015 SEMESTER THREE CAPSTONE PROJECT FOR THE AWARD OF BACHELOR OF SCIENCE IN NURSING Key words-Leadership, community health, sustainable development.

Bossini Proposal - 771 Words

Analyzing ‘Bossini’s’ Marketing Efforts in China Theme and scope of our project. To analyze and evaluate the characteristics and effectiveness of Bossini’s marketing strategy as a casual wear retailer in China. The marketing management and strategic issues that will be investigated and discussed. †¢ Identifying China as their key growth driver for the future With the government’s aim to bolster domestic spending and the vast potential for consumer consumption in the retail apparel market, Bossini has identified China as a key growth driver in the medium and long term. Bossini has devoted many resources to develop this market, making China a central part of their corporate strategy. What has Bossini done to penetrate†¦show more content†¦Bossini has managed to increase its operating margin while opening many new stores that have yet to achieve full operational efficiency. What has Bossini done during this expansion period to become so efficient and cost effective? What smart investment choices did it making during the period of economic downturn? How did it improve its supply chain management capabilities? †¢ Dealing with ever-increasing competition in a new market. China has serious growth potential due to their immense population. Every major fashion retailer manufacturer, as well as small niche brands will look to get a piece of this enormous market. Bossini faces stiff competition from international conglomerates like HM, Zara, Meters, Bonwe, Semir and Giordano. What can the marketing managers at Bossini do to gain a competitive advantage and create a market for itself when faced with such stiff competition? Ways to collect data 1. Interview with Bossini management In order to have more accurate and detail understanding of Bossini’s strategies adopted in China market, an interview with Bossini management would allow us to gather more information on how their strategies, specifically the reasoning behind their growth strategy, the effective implementation of their growth, and theirShow MoreRelatedUniqlo Written Proposal1688 Words   |  7 PagesIntroduction to Business Written Proposal Introduction: This report is about Uniqlo’s competitive environment using Michael Porter’s Five Force Model. Uniqlo is a Japanese company which engages in designing casual wear clothes, manufacturing clothes and retailing clothes. Uniqlo in Hong Kong has established a profitable business constantly recording extremely high sales on a per store basis. Uniqlo offers fashionable and high quality clothing at reasonable prices, and was seized as an opportunity

Understanding Abstract Art Essay Research Paper Almost free essay sample

Understanding Abstract Art Essay, Research Paper About all graphics in the western universe has depicted a capable easy recognizable to the spectator up until the beginning of this century. Art without a recognizable capable affair, known as? abstract art? , is alone to this period. Abstract art hasn? T been analyzed on its ain in every bit much item as other manners of art more easy defined. Alternatively it frequently times gets placed in a more general class called? Modernism? . This, possibly, is a consequence of its diverseness. Artists working in the abstract genre Don? T belong to a individual motion, which makes the true definition hard to get at. If we were to state abstract art is non-representational or non-objective, we would be connoting that it has no relation to natural objects. ( Rosenthal 1 ) Terminology therefore becomes about a barrier when analysing art and particularly abstract art. The word abstraction is chiefly used because it is widely accepted in modern-day use and International Relations and Security Netw ork? t needfully the individual, most appropriate term. We will write a custom essay sample on Understanding Abstract Art Essay Research Paper Almost or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page Artists of our clip hold begun making plants of art without any evident capable affair at all and establishing them basically on formal composing. Many of the creative persons whom work in this mode are showing their emotions while cut downing or extinguishing mentions to the physical universe. For person new to this signifier of art it offers really small hints as to its content or capable affair. Without an apprehension of what the creative persons are seeking to show we can see certain troubles when sing an abstract piece of art. This is what causes people non to take it earnestly and why merely really few people could state that abstraction takes on a earnestness and complexness equivalent to the great chef-doeuvres of the yesteryear. ( Rosenthal 1 ) Artists of abstract pictures put a batch of demands on the perceiver for they give them no get downing topographic point in the natural universe. The perceiver is required to to the full absorb him or herself in the picture. The creative person normally tries non to except the perceiver from the piece alternatively he/she attempts to impact or pass on with the perceiver by usage of traditional ocular linguistic communication. If they wanted to convey repose they might utilize soft symmetrical composings or crisp diagonal lines to stress battle. ( Rosenthal 3 ) In order to appreciate and judge any work of art it is first necessary to understand the creative person? s purposes. Once the spectator has a steadfast apprehension of what the creative person meant to make or seek to show they can so judge the grade of success the creative person had. One of the earliest abstract painters, Wassily Kandinsky, is an of import figure because he was besides one of the first to seek and explicate why he was making it. He described one of his first experiences with abstract art which to him was really personal and alone, he said: ? I was returning, immersed in idea, from my sketching, when on opening the studio door, I was confronted by a image of indefinable and candent comeliness. Bewildered, I stopped, gazing at it. The picture lacked all topic, depicted no identifiable object and was wholly composed of bright colour spots. Finally I approached closer and merely so recognized it for what it truly was? my ain picture, standing on its side on the easel? One thing became clear to me? that objectivity, the word picture of objects, needed no topographic point in my pictures, and was so harmful to them. ? ( Read 190 ) He felt that it was necessary for the spectator to larn how to look at his pictures, which in portion meant ignoring the wonts acquired from looking at representational art. The enticement to seek and see a familiar object in a blob is frequently times resistless. This impulse makes it extremely hard to make a truly abstract image. ( Whitford 29-30 ) In his earlier work, his abstraction was neer so pure that it did non hold an implied or deliberately subliminal topic. Even in his images that he regarded as strictly abstract one can see similar subjects. If pure abstraction is the standards, one could about see Kandinsky as more of a transitional figure so of an existent innovator. Though as with every abstract artist, this could be questioned. All abstractions even though they are abstract still will touch to or typify s omething because merely in making it the creative person is stating something and showing something. Without any evident capable affair, abstract creative persons were left with happening a solution to replace the now? losing object? . Another influential abstract artist, Jackson Pollock stated that? Today painters do non hold to travel to a capable affair outside of themselves? .they work from within? . ( Rosenthal 281 ) Pollock? s plants were created with a ferocious degree of focal point and they record the motions of the creative person every bit good as his mental energy. He was seeking to convey, without the? clip slowdown? between the idea and response, his critical urges of his head and organic structure. Capable affair now became unfastened to the creative person and frequently times became feelings or tempers of the creative person. Kandinsky felt that all signifiers originate in echt feelings and hence he had important sums of content to work from. Even though Kandinsky gave his work an abstract visual aspect it ever, as he claimed, had something being represented One of the most popular abstract painters Piet Mondrian tried stressing that it is non capable affair that the abstract creative person is seeking to portray, it is the stylistic discovery that makes abstract art so outstanding. It is about the battle of happening a manner and one time that is achieved the creative person can so get down to show capable affair. ( Rosenthal 39 ) Get downing his calling as a painter of nature, Mondrian? s earlier plants were landscapes dominated by a individual object. He easy began depriving down the objects from a comparatively accurate transcript to an abstract picture consisting of the objects indispensable signifier in a series of pictures. Once he established this basic linguistic communication of signifiers, he no longer needed mention to the physical universe and his pictures were created wholly from his caput. ( Whitford 19 ) His end was to spot a fundamental construction in the universe and demo it with the fewest and clearest elements possible. ( Milner 7 ) The topic of the abstract painter varies from creative person to artist. Some like Jackson Pollock did non utilize any outside mentions and painted wholly from their caput while others, such as Kandinsky, frequently used capable affair from the physical universe and stripped it down till it was no longer seeable. Mondrian every bit good as Kandinsky were involved in or at least influenced by the Theosophists? belief in the mysticism of colour and signifier. They believed that through the usage of colour and organize one could enrich the psyche by the? quivers? they called Forth. The mystics? felt that the transference of these quivers was merely possible through a clairvoyant, Kandinsky, nevertheless, saw the creative person as a possible medium. Mondrian joined the Theosophical Society in 1909, but its influence was non evident in his work until several old ages subsequently. Later in Kandinsky? s life, his attitudes towards Theosophy changed. Its influence remained with him as an ideal and encouraged his alteration to geometric abstraction. ( Moszynska 49 ) Abstractions outgrowth in the art universe besides relates to what was traveling on with the development of picture taking. Photography forced, in a sense, artists to review their ability to animate a convincing word picture of world. This freed creative persons from animating the physical universe and many turned to more subjective affair such as emotions and feelings. Abstract creative persons neer belonged to any one motion in the art community and there are virtually as many signifiers of it as there are creative persons. Hence, abstraction is non a manner instead it is an attitude. There are two manners of abstraction and all abstract plants of art can fall into one of two classs, geometric or organic. ( Whitford 128 ) Organic abstraction is based on the ocular linguistic communication of nature and suggests growing and alteration. Geometric abstraction employs the usage of geometric signifiers in its composings. Basically all graphics comes down to the same fundamental elements, colour, signifier, composing and look being the most of import. Art may be showing anything from spiritual beliefs to a personal feeling of the creative person. When portraying an image to the universe, it is the attack the creative person takes in work outing and making the image that makes it different. If we were to thoroughly analyze art of every genre and stylistic attack, we would happen, that all representational graphics contains some signifier of abstraction and all abstract plants of art contain some kind of representation. All art therefore basically is representational in that it represents something and every bit all art is abstract in that it is neer the pure object ( s ) . ( Moszynska 9 ) When the creative person is making non-representational art he is looking inward and one could state making from the unconscious. The picture so, normally becomes a representation of the creative persons? feelings, emotions, temper, energy or any other look that is non-physical. Representational art is based on the universe around the creative person and we could state created from the witting. Often times this attack, which begins in the physical universe, ends up arousing some of the non-material looks that the abstract creative person is seeking to portray. Both creative persons are stand foring every bit good as abstracting and it is merely a affair of what is more dominant in the work of art that categorizes it. Worlds have a natural inclination to seek and associate and compare everything they come across with something else, in order to categorise it. With abstract art this becomes a trouble because we tend to set it all into one group despite its discrepancies. It so becomes about impossible to analyse and depict comprehensively which is why I feel it is so successful. As the development of art progresses farther, the differences between abstract and representational art become less obvious. ? A image # 8211 ; before it is a battlehorse, a bare adult female, or some anecdote? is basically a plane surface covered with colourss assembled in a certain order. ? Maurice Denis Plants Cited Milner, John. Mondrian. New York: Abbeville Press, 1992 Moszynska, Anna. Abstract Art. London: Thames and Hudson Ltd, 1990 Read, Herbert. A Concise History Of Modern Painting. London: Thames and Hudson Ltd, 1974 Rosenthal, Mark. Abstraction in the Twentieth Century: Entire Hazard, Freedom, Discipline. NewYork: Guggenheim Museum Publications, 1996 Whitford, Frank. Understanding Abstract Art. New York: E. P. Dutton, 1987

Bill Clinton Essays - Mental Processes, Memory, Cognition

Bill Clinton The article I chose is called Reinventing yourself and it talks about research on memory. According to the author who you are is limited only by your imagination. What does it mean? Thats what I will try to explain on the following couple pages. As I understood this article, its talking about how our imagination influences the memory. It starts with the examples from peoples lives. Bill Clinton told American people that he never served for Vietnam, and the reasons he gave appeared to be totally different from the reasons that came up after a research. Or, Gary Trudeau, cartoonist, that was telling people the same story for about 20 years about the way he avoided army, saying that he was a student and his three-year student deferment had run out, which meant his call-up was imminent. In fact, what appeared after a research, his dad was a doctor, and he didnt serve in Vietnam because of his health condition. This is a good example of how our present life develops our imagination that adds to the memory and makes it different from a reality. But this is the way our imagination reflects and connects our past, present and future. And sometimes we start to think about what do we need a memory for. And the answer is to learn from our experiences without having to repeat them endlessly. Thats why very few moments in our life can repeat exactly. And when we share the personal histories, it helps to keep the relationships going, but, as a matter of fact, what really happened is not that dramatic and critical as the way we talk about it afterwards. Lets imagine talking about memories from childhood, and suddenly somebody interrupts us and says that it couldnt happened and you are wrong. What are you going to do? How are you going to prove it? And what the statistics show now is that many people instead of trying to find a proof such as pictures, tapes, videos will prefer just to imagine what could happen and how would it feel if this could happen now. Psychologist Helen Hembrook discovered this. In 1996 psychologists made a research by giving the example of the same events to the same people twice that could happen to them in their childhood, and it appeared that many of them gave different answers twice and, besides this, some of them just imagined that it could happened to them and this made them to really believe that it happened. Thats what the psychologists call imagination inflation. Also, sometimes, we can remember the source of the information better than the information by itself, and opposite, the information without a source, that is called source monitoring according to Marcia Johnson. And, of course, we remember recent experiments more accurately and more likely to interpret them correctly than childhood ones that we normally confuse. Certainly, we cant confuse everything, and there are some things that we cant make ourselves to believe in, such as I won a lottery, when you never did win one. So, basically, the whole article comes to the main point that we rely on memories of the past to help us imagine and make sense of the present. We develop some experiences that are common and dont change, like for example, going to the restaurant, waiting for waiter to bring a bill, etc. Sometimes people use their imagination to make sense of someone elses past. To prove this, author gives an example Hillary Rodham Clinton that was trying to explain her husbands unfaithfulness as a result of being in the middle of conflict between two women that surrounded the boy in his childhood. And this is something that she has been told by couple psychologist and certainly can be right. The thing is that we often forget bad memories but scientific study doesnt support this point of view and says that such bad memories as childhood sexual abuse and so on just seem to be forgotten, but they are not, and sooner or later the present will reflect this past. Sometimes there are situations when imagination becomes a terribly dangerous problem. It happens when it makes us to believe in some events and

How To Calculate the Variance and Standard Deviation

How To Calculate the Variance and Standard Deviation Variance and standard deviation are two closely related measures of variation that you will hear about a lot in studies, journals, or statistics class. They are two basic and fundamental concepts in statistics that must be understood in order to understand most other statistical concepts or procedures. Below, we’ll review what they are and how to find the variance and standard deviation. Key Takeaways: Variance and Standard Deviation The variance and standard deviation show us how much the scores in a distribution vary from the average.The standard deviation is the square root of the variance.For small data sets, the variance can be calculated by hand, but statistical programs can be used for larger data sets. Definition By definition, variance and standard deviation are both measures of variation for interval-ratio variables. They describe how much variation or diversity there is in a distribution. Both the variance and standard deviation increase or decrease based on how closely the scores cluster around the mean. Variance is defined as the average of the squared deviations from the mean. To calculate the variance, you first subtract the mean from each number and then square the results to find the squared differences. You then find the average of those squared differences. The result is the variance. The standard deviation is a measure of how spread out the numbers in a distribution are. It indicates how much, on average, each of the values in the distribution deviates from the mean, or center, of the distribution. It is calculated by taking the square root of the variance. A Conceptual Example The variance and standard deviation are important because they tell us things about the data set that we can’t learn just by looking at the mean, or average. As an example, imagine that you have three younger siblings: one sibling who is 13, and twins who are 10. In this case, the average age of your siblings would be 11. Now imagine that you have three siblings, ages 17, 12, and 4. In this case, the average age of your siblings would still be 11, but the variance and standard deviation would be larger. A Quantitative Example Let’s say we want to find the variance and standard deviation of the age among your group of 5 close friends. The ages of you and your friends are 25, 26, 27, 30, and 32. First, we must find the mean age: (25 26 27 30 32) / 5 28. Then, we need to calculate the differences from the mean for each of the 5 friends. 25 – 28 -326 – 28 -227 – 28 -130 – 28 232 – 28 4 Next, to calculate the variance, we take each difference from the mean, square it, then average the result. Variance ( (-3)2 (-2)2 (-1)2 22 42)/ 5 (9 4 1 4 16 ) / 5 6.8 So, the variance is 6.8. And the standard deviation is the square root of the variance, which is 2.61. What this means is that, on average, you and your friends are 2.61 years apart in age. Although it’s possible to calculate the variance by hand for smaller data sets such as this one, statistical software programs can also be used to calculate the variance and standard deviation. Sample Versus Population When conducting statistical tests, it’s important to be aware of the difference between a population and a sample. To calculate the standard deviation (or variance) of a population, you would need to collect measurements for everyone in the group you’re studying; for a sample, you would only collect measurements from a subset of the population. In the example above, we assumed that the group of five friends was a population; if we had treated it as a sample instead, calculating the sample standard deviation and sample variance would be slightly different (instead of dividing by the sample size to find the variance, we would have first subtracted one from the sample size and then divided by this smaller number). Importance of the Variance and Standard Deviation The variance and standard deviation are important in statistics, because they serve as the basis for other types of statistical calculations. For example, the standard deviation is necessary for converting test scores into Z-scores. The variance and standard deviation also play an important role when conducting statistical tests such as t-tests. References Frankfort-Nachmias, C. Leon-Guerrero, A. (2006). Social Statistics for a Diverse Society. Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press.