how to explain why a scatter plot data is positive or negative correlation

Question

How to explain wether a scatter plot data is negative or positive 

Answer 1

Kemal is correct.

 

Also, the "closeness" to the line of best-fit is measured as the "Correlation Coefficient".  That's probably a bit beyond your class (but you would absolutely see it in Statistics).  It's value is anything between (and including) +1 to -1.  A perfect line with a positive correlation (both increase together or decrease together) is +1, and a perfect line with negative correlation (as one increases, the other decreases) would have -1.

 

This is often confused with "slope".  Kinda similar, but slope measures the "steepness" of a line, while correlation measures the "closeness" of a line.

Answer 2

Hi Jadelyn,

 

If the variables increase or decrease together, i.e., move in the same direction then this is a positive correlation.

If they move in opposite directions, for example one increases as the other decreases, then the correlation is negative.