Measures of skewness are meant to give an idea about the direction and degree of asymmetry in a variable. These measures can be absolute or relative.
Methods of Measuring Skewness :
(i) Karl Pearson’s Measure : This measure is based on statistical averages.
(a) Absolute Measure (Skewness) (Sk) :
(b) Relative Measure or Coefficient of Skewness (J) :
The direction of skewness is represented by algebraic sign, if it is plus, skewness is positive. If it is minus, skewness is negative.
(ii) Bowley’s Measure or Quartiles Measure : Bowley‘s measure of skewness is called second measure of skewness. This measure is useful in distributions where mode is ill-defined and can also be used in open end distributions.
SkQ = Q3 = Q1—2M
