Minitab Project Report Application of Assistant (one sample t-test) Statistics is challenging but with Minitab Assistant Menu

we can easily analyze our data and conveniently interpret the results. The Assistant Menu use commonly used statistical tools and provide guidance to help you choose the right statistical tools. The most distinctive feature of Assistant menu is its capability of interpreting the statistical results which has been a nightmare for the social scientists in the past.

Example: The height of all students of PYP follows a normal distribution. Ten students chosen at

random and their heights are recorded in inches are 63, 63, 66, 67, 68, 69, 70, 70, 71, 71. In the light of these data, discuss the suggestion that the mean height of all PYP students is 66 inches. Step:1 From the menu go to Assistant > Graphical Analysis (a note will appear telling what all is there is Graphical analysis).

Press Graphic Analysis a pop-up option box Choose a Graphical Analysis will appear. Take the cursor to Graphical Summary it will be highlighted click it and another dialogue box will pop-up.

This the

is

Graphical Summary dialogue box. Move the variable Height to space the Y

column: Then press OK.

You will see a Summary for Height appearing on the screen. This gives the bar chart of the data along with the normal curve and some descriptive statistics coupled with normality tests in the right panel. Below the

graph

are

the

confidence intervals of mean and the median. So we can say that this option gives us all in one summary

statistics.

Now let us ask the Assistant how to go for one sample t-test. Follow the screen shoot on the right and click:Hypothesis Test.

A pop-up option dialogue box will appear take the cursor on 1-sample t and click then a 1-Sample t Test dialogue box will appear.

In the Data column move the variable Height. In the space Target enter 66. Since our alternative hypothesis will be HA: 66 so we select the third radio button. Then enter the Alpha level (or level of significance as it is commonly known in statistical jargon) 0.05.If you press the down arrow key you can see the other options for Alpha. In the difference we enter the value if we are interested in Power and sample size. It is advisable for the researchers to perform the power analysis before embarking on doing their research it helps them to determine the optimum sample size and the power of the test prior to data analysis. If you enter a value here than the diagnostic report will be generated. (Brief explanation of the diagnostic report is appended after the conclusion in the highlighted text box). Press OK. Minitab generates three Report cards which are very exhaustive and comprehensive. The Summary Report The Diagnostic Report The Report Card

The salient features of the summary report are the p-value, Statistics portion and the first comment in the comments portion.

1-Sample t Test for the Mean of Height Summary Report

Does the mean differ from 66? 0 0.1 > 0.5

Statistics Sample size Mean 95% CI Standard deviation Target 10 67.8 (65.646, 69.954) 3.0111 66

Yes
P = 0.091 The mean of Height is not significantly different from the target (p > 0.05).

No

Distribution of Data Where are the data relative to the target?

66

Comments

-- Test: There is not enough evidence to conclude that the mean differs from 66 at the 0.05 level of significance. -- CI: Quantifies the uncertainty associated with estimating the mean from sample data. You can be 95% confident that the true mean is between 65.646 and 69.954.

62

64

66

68

70

To put it in a nut shell the summary reports tell us that since theP-value (0.09) is greater than Alpha level (0.05) therefore we do not reject the Null Hypothesis Ho: = 66.

The Diagnostic report is generated if you entered the difference value in the 1sample t-Test discussed on the previous page. This report tells us that in order to observe the difference as large as 1.5 then the sample should be of size 34 students instead of 10 students and then we will be 80% chance of rejecting the Ho:=66.

1-Sample t Test for the Mean of Height Diagnostic Report

Data in Worksheet Order Investigate outliers (marked in red).
75 70 65 60

Power What is the chance of detecting a difference? Difference of interest: 1.5 < 40% 60% 90% 100%

What sample size is required to detect a difference of 1.5? Sample Size Power 22 27 34 45 60.0 70.0 80.0 90.0

2.3633 3.4765 1.5 For alpha = 0.05 and sample size = 10: If the true mean differed from the target by 1.5 in either direction, you would have a 29.1% chance of detecting the difference.

Your Sample 10 29.1

Power is a function of the sample size and the standard deviation. If the power is not satisfactory, consider increasing the sample size.

The third report card -provides assumption checks to warn us when our analysis may be suspect i.e. not as good as they should have been -is not produced instead a conclusion and the highlighted text box is produced for the users convenience.

Conclusion: Since the p-value is greater than 0.05 level of significance therefore the null hypothesis Ho: =66 cannot be rejected and we may conclude that the population mean height of PYP students is 66 inches. What if our null hypothesis is in fact false and the mean height is actually greater than 66. From the past records it has been estimated that the mean height of PYP students is 67.5 inches. Keeping in view the past records the researcher suggests that the population average height is 67.5. So now, the question arises how large a sample be selected in order to reject the false null hypothesis. For this we need to do power analysis which is shown in the second graph. Power means the probability of rejecting a false null hypothesis and is denoted by 1-. The Graph suggests that we need a sample of 34 students to achieve the power of 0.80 i.e. to get an 80% chance of rejecting a false null hypothesis we must select a sample of 34 PYP students. Therefore, having a small sample in fact increases our type -II error i.e. accepting a false null hypothesis when in fact our alternative hypothesis is true. In other words type-II () error can be controlled by increasing the sample size.