low-kurtosis
|low-kur-to-sis|
🇺🇸
/loʊ kɚˈtoʊsɪs/
🇬🇧
/ləʊ kɜːˈtɒsɪs/
having lighter tails / flatter peak
Etymology
'low-kurtosis' is a modern English compound formed from 'low' + 'kurtosis'. 'Low' originates from Old English 'hlāw' meaning 'not high, a mound/hill' and later developed to mean 'of small height' or 'less'. 'Kurtosis' originates from Modern Greek/Neo-Latin formation based on Greek elements (often linked to Greek kur(t)- 'curved, arched') and was adopted into statistical terminology in the late 19th/early 20th century to describe the 'peakedness' or tail-heaviness of a distribution.
'kurtosis' was coined into scientific usage via New Latin/German mathematical literature (becoming the statistical term 'kurtosis' in modern English) while 'low' has been present since Old English; the compound 'low-kurtosis' emerged as statisticians described distributions with comparatively low kurtosis (platykurtic) relative to others.
Initially the Greek root related to 'curved' or 'humped' shapes; in statistical usage 'kurtosis' came to quantify the shape of a distribution's peak and tails. 'Low-kurtosis' therefore evolved to mean 'having a flatter peak and thinner tails (fewer extremes)' in modern statistics.
Meanings by Part of Speech
Noun 1
the property or state of having low kurtosis (used as a noun phrase: 'low kurtosis').
Researchers noted the low kurtosis of the sample when assessing tail risk.
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Adjective 1
having relatively low kurtosis (platykurtic); a probability distribution that has lighter tails and a flatter peak compared with a normal distribution, implying fewer extreme outliers.
The low-kurtosis model predicts fewer extreme losses than the heavy-tailed alternatives.
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Last updated: 2025/08/28 12:13