100% stacked bar charts · 3 marks

The following chart shows the time spent on different activities in a day by the average Indian. What do you notice? What do you wonder about?

Answer: Sleep takes the biggest part (34%, about 8 hours), then leisure, social & travel (27%, about 6½ hours). Paid work (10%) and learning (5%) look small. You may notice that this does not match your own day (you hardly do paid work, and your parents spend no time learning): the strip is an average over people of all ages, genders, regions and backgrounds, so it hides those differences.

Step-by-step solution

Idea: Convert each percentage into hours (× 24). Then remember what an average does: it mixes very different people into one ‘typical’ day that few people actually live.

In hours (24 h = 100%): sleep 34% ≈ 8.2 h, personal care 13% ≈ 3.1 h, paid work 10% ≈ 2.4 h, unpaid work & care 11% ≈ 2.6 h, learning 5% ≈ 1.2 h, leisure, social & travel 27% ≈ 6.5 h.1 mark
Notice: sleep and leisure together take about 60% of the day; paid and unpaid work take about the same time as each other (about 2½ hours each); learning is the smallest part.1 mark
Wonder: paid work of only 2.4 h and learning of only 1.2 h look strange for anyone’s real day. This is because the chart averages children, working adults and the elderly together: a student learns many hours and does no paid work, while a parent works and does no learning. Questions to ask: how do these numbers change by age, gender, or between villages and cities?1 mark

The average Indian spends about a third of the day sleeping and about a quarter on leisure, social activity and travel; work and learning look small because the chart averages people of all ages, genders, regions and backgrounds. So it may not match your own day or your parents’ day.

Answer to write in the exam

Sleep 34% ≈ 8 h; leisure, social & travel 27% ≈ 6½ h; personal care 13% ≈ 3 h

Paid work 10% ≈ 2½ h; unpaid work & care 11% ≈ 2½ h; learning 5% ≈ 1 h

Sleep is the largest part, learning the smallest

The chart is an average over people of all ages, genders and regions

∴ It hides differences: students do little paid work, adults little learning

Common mistakes that cost marks

Reading 34% as 34 hours. The whole bar is 24 hours, so 34% ≈ 8.2 hours.
Concluding that Indians ‘do not work much’. The average includes children and the elderly who do no paid work.
Adding the percentages to more or less than 100%.

How this can come in the exam

MCQ (1 mark)

In a 100% stacked bar of a 24-hour day, an activity takes 25%. How many hours is that?

4 h
6 h
8 h
25 h

Show answer

(B) 6 h
25% of 24 h = 6 h.

Try one yourself

A student’s day: sleep 9 h, school 7 h, homework 3 h, play 2 h, other 3 h. Write each as a percentage of the day.