SEARCH MATHEMATICA 8 DOCUMENTATION

THIS IS DOCUMENTATION FOR AN OBSOLETE PRODUCT.
SEE THE DOCUMENTATION CENTER FOR THE LATEST INFORMATION.

Mathematica > Descriptive Statistics >

Kurtosis

Kurtosis[list]
gives the coefficient of kurtosis for the elements in list.

Kurtosis[dist]
gives the coefficient of kurtosis for the symbolic distribution dist.

Kurtosis measures the concentration of data around the peak and in the tails versus the concentration in the flanks.

A kurtosis larger than 3 indicates a distribution that is more peaked and has heavier tails than a normal distribution with the same variance. A kurtosis smaller than 3 indicates a distribution that is flatter.

Kurtosis[{{x₁, y₁, ...}, {x₂, y₂, ...}, ...}] gives {Kurtosis[{x₁, x₂, ...}], Kurtosis[{y₁, y₂, ...}], ...}.

Kurtosis for a list of values:

Kurtosis for a symbolic distribution:

New in 6