A dentist is interested in the number of adult teeth his patients have and the length of their incisors (mm). Which is true?

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The question asks about the nature of two variables: the number of adult teeth and the length of incisors in millimeters.
First, consider the count of adult teeth. This is a countable, finite quantity that can take whole number values (e.g., 28, 29, 30, up to 32 in typical adults). Such quantities are discrete because you cannot have a fraction of a tooth in a meaningful measurement for a count.
Next, the length of incisors in millimeters is a measurement that can be taken with any real value within a range (e.g., 8.25 mm, 9.6 mm, 10.0 mm). Measurements like this are continuous because there are infinitely many possible values between any two measurements, and you can record values to any desired precision.
Therefore, the statement—"Number of adult teeth is discrete, and incisor length is continuous"—captures the correct categorization of these two variables.
A potential misconception would be to treat tooth counts as continuous, thinking you can have, say, 28.5 teeth; however, in practical terms, you can only have whole teeth counted, making it discrete. Conversely, failing to recognize that length measurements can be recorded with increasing precision ignores the fundamental idea that measurements derive from a continuous scale rather than a simple tally.
If there were multiple options, you would expect other choices to mischaracterize at least one of the variables, such as labeling tooth count as continuous or insisting all length measurements must be integers, which would be inaccurate.

STAT 1450.02 SP2025 (28132) Checkpoint 12.5 - 12.7

A dentist is interested in the number of adult teeth his patients have and the length of their incisors (mm). Which is true?

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