# Statistics/Summary/Averages/Harmonic Mean

Statistics
* Introduction
** What Is Statistics?
** Subjects in Modern Statistics
** Why Should I Learn Statistics?
** What Do I Need to Know to Learn Statistics?
* Different Types of Data
** Primary and Secondary Data
** Quantitative and Qualitative Data
* Methods of Data Collection
** Experiments
** Sample Surveys
** Observational Studies
* Data Analysis
** Data Cleaning
** Moving Average
* Summary Statistics
** Measures of center
*** Mean, Median, and Mode
*** Geometric Mean
*** Harmonic Mean
*** Relationships among Arithmetic, Geometric, and Harmonic Mean
*** Geometric Median
** Measures of dispersion
*** Range of the Data
*** Variance and Standard Deviation
*** Quartiles and Quartile Range
*** Quantiles
* Displaying Data
** Bar Charts
** Comparative Bar Charts
** Histograms
** Scatter Plots
** Box Plots
** Pie Charts
** Comparative Pie Charts
** Pictograms
** Line Graphs
** Frequency Polygon
* Probability
** Combinatorics
** Bernoulli Trials
** Introductory Bayesian Analysis
* Distributions
** Discrete Distributions
*** Uniform Distribution
*** Bernoulli Distribution
*** Binomial Distribution
*** Poisson Distribution
*** Geometric Distribution
*** Negative Binomial Distribution
*** Hypergeometric Distribution
** Continuous Distributions
*** Uniform Distribution
*** Exponential Distribution
*** Gamma Distribution
*** Normal Distribution
*** Chi-Square Distribution
*** Student-t Distribution
*** F Distribution
*** Beta Distribution
*** Weibull Distribution
* Testing Statistical Hypothesis
** Purpose of Statistical Tests
** Formalism Used
** Different Types of Tests
** z Test for a Single Mean
** z Test for Two Means
** t Test for a single mean
** t Test for Two Means
** paired t Test for comparing Means
** One-Way ANOVA F Test
** z Test for a Single Proportion
** z Test for Two Proportions
** Testing whether Proportion A Is Greater than Proportion B in Microsoft Excel
** Spearman's Rank Coefficient
** Pearson's Product Moment Correlation Coefficient
** Chi-Squared Tests
*** Chi-Squared Test for Multiple Proportions
*** Chi-Squared Test for Contingency
** Approximations of distributions
* Point Estimates (12:07, 28 March 2007 (UTC))
** Unbiasedness
** Measures of goodness
** UMVUE
** Completeness
** Sufficiency and Minimal Sufficiency
** Ancillarity
* Practice Problems
** Summary Statistics Problems
** Data-Display Problems
** Distributions Problems
** Data-Testing Problems
* Numerical Methods
** Basic Linear Algebra and Gram-Schmidt Orthogonalization
** Unconstrained Optimization
** Quantile Regression
** Numerical Comparison of Statistical Software
** Numerics in Excel
** Statistics/Numerical_Methods/Random Number Generation
* Time Series Analysis
* Multivariate Data Analysis
** Principal Component Analysis
** Factor Analysis for metrical data
** Factor Analysis for ordinal data
** Canonical Correlation Analysis
** Discriminant Analysis
* Analysis of Specific Datasets
** Analysis of Tuberculosis
* Appendix
** Authors
** Glossary
** Index
** Links

### Harmonic Mean

The arithmetic mean cannot be used when we want to average quantities such as speed.
Consider the example below:
Example 1: The distance from my house to town is 40 km. I drove to town at a speed of 40 km per hour and returned home at a speed of 80 km per hour. What was my average speed for the whole trip?.
Solution: If we just took the arithmetic mean of the two speeds I drove at, we would get 60 km per hour. This isn't the correct average speed, however: it ignores the fact that I drove at 40 km per hour for twice as long as I drove at 80 km per hour. To find the correct average speed, we must instead calculate the harmonic mean.
For two quantities A and B, the harmonic mean is given by: ${\frac {2}{{\frac {1}{A}}+{\frac {1}{B}}}}$
This can be simplified by adding in the denominator and multiplying by the reciprocal: ${\frac {2}{{\frac {1}{A}}+{\frac {1}{B}}}}={\frac {2}{\frac {B+A}{AB}}}={\frac {2AB}{A+B}}$
For N quantities: A, B, C......
Harmonic mean = ${\frac {N}{{\frac {1}{A}}+{\frac {1}{B}}+{\frac {1}{C}}+\ldots }}$
Let us try out the formula above on our example:
Harmonic mean = ${\frac {2AB}{A+B}}$
Our values are A = 40, B = 80. Therefore, harmonic mean $={\frac {2\times 40\times 80}{40+80}}={\frac {6400}{120}}\approx 53.333$
Is this result correct? We can verify it. In the example above, the distance between the two towns is 40 km. So the trip from A to B at a speed of 40 km will take 1 hour. The trip from B to A at a speed to 80 km will take 0.5 hours. The total time taken for the round distance (80 km) will be 1.5 hours. The average speed will then be ${\frac {80}{1.5}}\approx$ 53.33 km/hour.
The harmonic mean also has physical significance.