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MLS-C01 Exploratory Data Analysis Practice Question

Which THREE techniques are commonly used in exploratory data analysis to understand the relationships between features and the target variable? (Select THREE.)

Answer choices

Why each option matters

Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.

Correct answer & explanation

Use box plots to compare feature distributions across target classes.

Options A, C, and D are correct. Box plots (A) are useful for comparing feature distributions across different target classes, revealing differences that may indicate predictive power. Scatter plots or pair plots (D) allow visual inspection of relationships between features and the target, highlighting patterns, clusters, or outliers. A correlation matrix (C) quantifies linear relationships between features and the target variable, helping identify strongly correlated features. B is incorrect because K-means clustering is an unsupervised technique used for grouping data, not for understanding feature-target relationships. E is incorrect because PCA is a dimensionality reduction technique, not a direct method for analyzing relationships between features and a target variable.

Answer analysis

Option-by-option breakdown

For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.

  • Use box plots to compare feature distributions across target classes.

    Why this is correct

    Box plots by class reveal differences in feature distributions.

  • Perform K-means clustering on the features.

    Why it's wrong here

    Clustering groups data, not for feature-target relationship.

  • Compute the correlation matrix between features and target.

    Why this is correct

    Correlation measures linear relationship strength.

  • Generate scatter plots or pair plots to visualize feature interactions.

    Why this is correct

    Pair plots show pairwise relationships including with target.

  • Apply Principal Component Analysis (PCA) to reduce dimensions.

    Why it's wrong here

    PCA is not primarily for understanding feature-target relationships.

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