Chronological classification
Also called: Temporal classification · Topic: Economic Data: Census, NSS, Surveys and Statistical Tools · NCERT: Class 11, Ch 3 "Organisation of Data"; Class 11, Ch 4 "Presentation of Data"; Class 11, Ch 8 "Use of Statistical Tools"
Meaning
Chronological classification groups data by time, such as years, quarters, months, weeks or hours. The values are arranged in time order, either ascending or descending. The result is a time series, which means data listed in time order. It lets you see how something changed over time, for example its long-run trend.
Example
India's population by census year: 35.7 crore (1951), 43.8 crore (1961), 54.6 crore (1971), 68.4 crore (1981), 81.8 crore (1991), 102.7 crore (2001) and 121.0 crore (2011). Each value sits against its year, so the steady rise is easy to see.
Don't confuse with
- Spatial classification: groups data by place, not time. One example is wheat yield in 2013 compared across India, France, China and other countries.
Related concepts
- Raw data
- Classification
- Spatial classification
- Qualitative classification
- Quantitative classification
- Attribute
- Continuous variable
- Discrete variable
- Frequency
- Frequency distribution