What Is the Mean Absolute Error of Recorded Time Periods for a Simple Pendulum?

Mean Absolute Error Calculation

Mean absolute error is a measure of how close predictions are to the actual values. In the context of recorded time periods for a simple pendulum, mean absolute error represents the average deviation between the recorded time periods and the mean of these periods.

To calculate the mean absolute error for the recorded time periods of 1.9, 2.0, and 2.1 seconds, we first need to find the mean or average of these periods. The mean period is calculated by adding up the three values and dividing by the total number of values (which is 3).

The mean period here is calculated as follows:

(1.9 + 2.0 + 2.1) / 3 = 2 seconds

Next, we find the absolute deviations of each recorded period from the mean period. The absolute deviation is the absolute value of the the difference between each recorded period and the mean period.

The absolute deviations are calculated as follows:

|2 - 1.9| = 0.1 second

|2 - 2.0| = 0 seconds

|2 - 2.1| = 0.1 second

Then, we find the average of these absolute deviations by summing them up and dividing by the total number of values (3).

Therefore, the mean absolute error for the recorded time periods of a simple pendulum in the experiments is about 0.033 seconds.