Variance and standard deviation functions deal with negative deviations by squaring deviations before they are averaged.
AVEDEV handles negative values by working only with absolute values.
This average is called the average absolute deviation.
One advantage of AVEDEV is that units remain unchanged.
If values are centimeters, the absolute average deviation is in centimeters as well.
AVEDEV takes multipleargumentsin the formnumber1,number2,number3, etc.
up to 255 total.
Arguments can be a hardcoded constant, a cell reference, or arange.
Empty cells, and cells that contain text or logical values are ignored.
STDEV Function
The Excel STDEV function returns the standard deviation for data that represents a sample.
To calculate the standard deviation for an entire population, use STDEVP or STDEV.P.
VAR Function
The Excel VAR function estimates the variance of a sample of data.
If data represents the entire population, use the VARP function or the newer VAR.P function.
VAR ignores text values and logicals in references.
