Abstract
Is there a trend toward global warming, or is the relatively warm weather of recent years just part of the variability expected in a process like the weather? This question is much debated partly because it is difficult to see long-term trends in data that is subject to many short-term fluctuations (sometimes called “jitters”). Some of the fluctuations can be removed, however, by “smoothing” the data. In this lesson, moving averages will be used to smooth temperature data from the coastal northeastern United States so that trends can be spotted more easily.
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References
Karl T.R., Baldwin R.G. and Burgin M.G. (1988) Time series of regional seasonal averages of maximum, minimum and average temperature, and diurnal temperature range across the United States: 1901-1984. Historical Climatology Series 4 - 5. National Climatic Data Center. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. National Environmental Satellite, Data and Information Service. Asheville, North Carolina.
Basic Petroleum Data Book. Petroleum Industry Statistics, Volume XIV, Number 1, January 1994, American Petroleum Institute, Washington D.C.
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© 1996 Springer Science+Business Media New York
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Scheaffer, R.L., Watkins, A., Gnanadesikan, M., Witmer, J.A. (1996). Getting Rid of the Jitters: Finding the Trend. In: Activity-Based Statistics. Textbooks in mathematical sciences. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4757-3843-8_7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4757-3843-8_7
Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY
Print ISBN: 978-0-387-94598-9
Online ISBN: 978-1-4757-3843-8
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