Values

An attribute of a given case has a value. Examples: The value of the number_of_siblings attribute for this person is 3; the value of the diameter attribute for this wheel is 7.5 cm; the value of the color attribute for this car is “cinnamon”. Some values are numeric, and these are either pure numbers or numbers with units (quantities). Other values are non-numeric, or categorical.

A value can be missing. Fathom displays these values in case tables or inspectors as an empty cell with a light yellow background. Normally, when a quantity is computed based on an attribute, the missing values are simply not part of the computation. Likewise, a case that has a missing value for a graphed attribute will not appear in the graph. There is no warning that some values are missing.