I am trying to show how much a certain thing has exceeded or fallen below its expectation. How do I calculate this? I forgot if this statistic is called Percent Difference or something else, I remember learning it in Chemistry for actual vs. experimental.
Stats:
Actual Value: 16
Projected Value: 11
How do I calculate that actual value has exceeded the projected expectation by some x %?
1 Answer
I'm assuming you want percent error. The formula for this is given by taking the absolute value of the difference between your actual and expected, and then dividing that by the expected to get a relative approximation. Therefore, your formula is
$$\frac{\left|\mathrm{Expected}-\mathrm{Actual}\right|}{\mathrm{Actual}}$$
or
$$\frac{\left|11-16\right|}{11}=\frac{5}{11}=45\% \text{ error}$$
You can then specify that your answer was above the expected result
