CORRELATION Introduction If two variables are measured for each experimental unit in a sample and bolls are random variables, that i neither X nor ¥ ean be controlled, we ean ealeulate the Pearson correlation coefficient between them ae a measure of the degree of Tinear relationship between the variables. ‘The data will consist of m pairs of observations, (21,31):(@2,a)i---s (ta) and te following notation is commonly wsed, sen = Dog Ea" Srv Sow El? Sxy = Sv EEN) Using this notation, the Pearson correlation coefficient, p, has as its sample ‘estimate, the value given by Sx xxi It can be shown that necessily -1 < r< 41. If'r = 1, the sample points lie on & straight line with positive slope, and if r = —1, the sample points lie on a straight line with negative slope. IF Ris close to £1 there is high degree of linear association between the variables X and Y, that is, the points lie close to a straight line If =0, or is close to zero, there is no linear relationship between the variables but ‘there may be a perfect non-linear relationship between the variables X' and Y. ‘The correlation coefficient for two variables can be found using MINITAB. If the values for one variable are in C1 of a MINITAB worksheet and the values for the other variable in €2, the appropriate command is WTB > cons ct «2CORRELATION Example ‘The following table glves the height in inches (X;) and weight in pounds (Y) for ach soudent in sample of nine ‘Height (X) Weight (¥) 66 131 7 ur or 128 64 ng 6 187 2 15 6 162 70 Ww 3 168 A scatter diagram, that is, plot of one variable against the other, cua be obtained ‘using MIITTAB to give the fllowing. ‘Scatterlot of Height vs Walght In this caso the variables show a high dagree of liner association, Minitab giving the correlation coefficient as 0.823. 12CORRELATION Hypothesis Testing ‘Under the assumption that the sample observations come from a bivariate normal Aistribution, wo can test My:p= my seins hip or an appropriate ue sie altertve ing the et static 1, (te 382) bic under teal iypoths has erm ston, Ea Example For example, to test in the previous example the null hypothesis that the population correlation is 0.75 against the alternative the itis grester thn 0.75, we caleulate and reject the null hypothesis at the 5% level of signlficance if this i greater then 2405 = 1.685. In this case, we conclude that the population correlation isnot significantly greater thn 0.75 wre > corr et 2 Correlations: Height, Weight Pearson covrelation of Height and Wesght = 0.823 P-alue = 0.008 ‘The p-value given by Minitab is the p-value for the test of Ho : 0 = 0 against hip #0. 13