A map showing California four-year universities based on average tuition costs is an example of which data type?

A map illustrating California four-year universities based on average tuition costs is best classified as a ratio data type. Ratio data possesses the characteristics of ordinal data—namely, it can be ordered or ranked (for instance, universities can be arranged from lowest to highest tuition costs)—and it also has a true zero point, which in this case means that a tuition cost of zero indicates a university with no fees.

In the context of tuition costs, the values can be compared in a meaningful way, allowing for statements such as "University A has tuition costs that are twice as high as University B." This ability to make such comparisons aligns with the characteristics of ratio data. For example, if the average tuition at one university is $10,000 and at another is $5,000, the first university's tuition is indeed twice as high as the second, which is a definitive characteristic of ratio data.

Nominal data, on the other hand, involves categorical data without any inherent order, while ordinal data also lacks a true zero point and does not allow for meaningful comparisons between the ranks. Interval data shares characteristics with ordinal data but is also distinct because it does not have a true zero point; the classic example is temperature measured in Celsius or Fahrenheit. Thus,