What do we call a statistical range where half the scores are above and half are below?

The statistical range described where half the scores fall above and half fall below is known as the median. This measure of central tendency is particularly useful because it provides a midpoint in a dataset, meaning that it effectively divides the data into two equal halves. In a sorted list of numbers, the median is found by identifying the middle value; if there is an even number of observations, the median is calculated by averaging the two middle numbers.

The median is less affected by extreme values or outliers compared to the mean, making it a more reliable indicator of central tendency in skewed distributions. In contrast, the mean is susceptible to being influenced by very high or very low scores. The mode refers to the most frequently occurring score in a dataset, while standard deviation measures the spread of scores around the mean. Each of these concepts serves a specific purpose in statistics, but the question specifically pertains to the concept of the median as the dividing point in a dataset.