Final answer:
The correct answer is option d) the mode or median.. The mode represents the most frequent value, and the median represents the central value in ordered data, both suitable for qualitative analysis.
Step-by-step explanation:
For qualitative data that can be ordered, we can find either the most frequently occurring value (the mode) or the value in the middle position when the data is ordered (the median). The mean, which is the arithmetic average, requires numerical values to calculate a sum, which is not always possible with qualitative data. However, the median and mode do not rely on the data being numerical as the median is determined by the middle position and the mode by frequency, making them suitable for ordered qualitative data.
While calculating the center of data, it's important to choose the right measure of central tendency. The median is robust against outliers which makes it helpful when dealing with extreme values, whereas the mode can provide insights into the most frequent categories or values in a given dataset, especially when the dataset is bimodal or multimodal.