8.2.2 Simple statistics

The minimum, maximum and standard deviation of the values result of great help to characterize the site and to compare with background levels or to expected verification criteria

The representation of the data population in histograms allows identifying the background level of the investigated site, as well as to explore the overall data distribution. The latter is of value as to have an initial estimate of the data fraction (area surveyed) that could be having elevated readings (hot spots). The radiological contamination, the statistical distribution is expected to be strongly skewed. Log scale or magnifying at small range of values may facilitate the histogram analysis.