Chapter 6: Estimation

 Populations include everyone, have unknowns, or “parameters”; samples have knowns or

“statistics”
 You can have one, two, or multiple samples (all drawn from a population
 In each of these, you can have continuous random variables (what we will work with) or discrete
random variables
 You can have large or small samples (each of which contains n persons/measurements)

 Throwback to last class (you weren’t there):

o Standard error is essentially the standard deviation of an estimator (read up, but
basically, it’s sigma divided by root n (i.e. the more measurements you have, the smaller
your standard error gets))
o Point estimates are completely useless  that collection of measurements might be off
from the “real” value, therefore you need a confidence interval
o In a normal standard deviation, the area between -2.58-2.58 has 99% of central area,
(negative) 1.98- 1.98 covers 95%, -1.645-1.645 covers 68%. Useful numbers to know.

CH 7:

 H0 is the null hypothesis (there is no statistically significant relationship between two variables);
H1 or HA is the alternative or research hypothesis. Remember, just because you cannot reject the
null hypothesis DOES NOT MEAN THERE IS NO CORRELATION
o Absence of evidence is NOT evidence of absence!
 Formatting:

 In one sample problems, we can reject either hypothesis (if one is true, you must reject the
other)
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o Accept correct H0 hypothesis (accept H0 when H0 is true), accepting correct H1
hypothesis, accepting incorrect H0 hypothesis, accepting incorrect H1 hypothesis
 True negative, True positive, False negative, False positive
 True results are great, but others lead to Type I and Type II errors
o Type I: Pr {Rejecting H0\H0 is true}  lower left box in 2x2 table (alpha [α])
o Type II: Pr {failing to reject H0\H1 is true}  upper right box in 2x2 table (beta [β])
 In a courtroom example, a guilty verdict when the person is innocent is type I,
whereas an innocent verdict when the person is guilty is type II (given the null
hypothesis is innocence and the alternative hypothesis is guiltiness)
 POWER!
o The power of a test is defined as 1 – β = 1 – Pr(type II error) = Pr(reject H0\H0 is true)
o Aim of hypothesis testing is to use statistical tests that make α and β as small as
possible.
 One-sample Hypothesis Testing for Mean of Normal Distribution

o X bar is often used because tests based on sample means have the highest power
among all tests with a given type I error α.
 Recall E(X bar) = µ
  It is an unbiased estimator, and has immensely low variance (so great)
o One sided test – values of parameter being studied can be either greater than or less
than values under H0, but cannot be both

 How do we make an objective decision whether or not to reject H0?

o V IMPORTANT SLIDE!!

o
 Tips and tricks – write out every value you are given and the corresponding
variable, then plug it in as necessary. Find your t value (value of test statistic),
 the corresponding critical value for your sample and test (tn-1, α), and if your
value is less than the critical value, you reject the null hypothesis.
 P value method for hypothesis testing
o P value is the α level at which we would be indifferent between accepting or rejecting
the null hypothesis; borderline between acceptance and rejection regions.
o Defined as: p= Pr(tn-1≤ t)
o Area under the t distribution that is less than your critical value
o If null hypothesis is true, what is the likelihood we will see some extreme value?
 Small usually indicates you should reject the null hypothesis, large indicates you
should accept null (ish)
 Recall:
o Inference is made up of estimation and Hyopthesis testing
 Estimation (e.g. µ):
 Point estimate (x bar)
 Confidence interval
 Confidence level (alpha [α])
 Hypothesis Testing (e.g. µ):
 Test statistic
 Critical value for p value
 Significance level (alpha [α])
 P value can be thought of as the probability of observing such an extreme value as that
observed under the condition H0 is true.

 Statistical vs Scientific Significance:

o You need to remember context when applying p values (e.g. you could have highly
significant results, but if the results do not suggest a necessary change or problem, they
are not of scientific importance)
 Two-Sided Alternatives (H0 µ ≠ µ0)
o Tests for alternatives on either side of the null mean; rejects H0 if the parameter is
greater than or less than the values under the null hypothesis
o Two-sided may be more conservative (did not need to know which way it may differ
from null hypothesis); one sided may have higher power.
 Decision to do one or two-sided analyses must be made BEFORE data collection.
o In some applications, if variance is known and sample size is large (n > 200), you can
approximate a normal distribution and translate to z values  advantageous as no
degrees of freedom are needed.
 If the expected value does not fall within the confidence interval, REJECT THE NULL. By
definition, the confidence interval does not contain any value of µ for which H0 can be rejected.
 Power of a test: Power= 1 – β = Pr{rejecting alt hypothesis\null hypothesis is false}
o Usually power is calculated before a study is started (80% is good), sometimes there is a
pilot study.
o We assume standard deviation is known (can be projected w/o any data) and base
power calculations on one-sample z test.
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 Effect Measure (e.g. RR, OR)
o Null Hypothesis is always RR or OR = 1 (Pr(event/A) = Pr(event/B))
o Further from null, easier to choose as correct hypothesis
 At a fixed set of parameters, two-sided will always require a larger sample size than one-sided
 Sample size also has a bearing on CI width, denoted as L

 N = (z1-a/22 x s2)/d2; L = 2d
 Margin of error: (d)
o The more precision you want, the more people you need and the smaller your d will be
 Inferences about σ2 can be important
o Because it is skewed, you need to use a skewed distribution (chi square)
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 I like this example

 Recall denominator is standard error of p hat

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 Look at the summary; make sure you know things

CH 8 – Two Sample Hypothesis Testing

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 There are two true means for each of the populations, which are usually estimated as x bar 1
and x bar 2
 Depending on the study design, different tests are available (e.g. you can have a longitudinal, or
follow-up study (uses paired sample design), or a cross-sectional study (uses independent
sample design))
o Paired samples – each point in the first sample is matched to a singular point in the
second
o Independent – data points in one sample are completely unrelated to those in the
second
 Paired uses paired t-test:
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o So essentially you combine the two into one, you really only care about the differences

MISSING 2 LECTURES. FILL IN YOUR NOTES AFTER MIDTERMS AND COMPS ISIS LUNSKY

 (Slide 31- BLESS UP PLS)

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 The denominator is the standard error of… x1 – x2
 You need to know what estimator you’re using (if you know that with the utmost certainty, hard
to get confused. Otherwise, easy)
 Your parameter is your unknown (numerator); the standard error of the estimator is the
denominator
 Make a chart of parameters, corresponding estimators, and how to calculate standard error of
these estimators
 s2 is sample variance, s is sample standard deviation (these are σ in the population)
 So now we have 2 variances in 2 different populations – how do we take a weighted average?
o S2pooled = (n1 – 1)*s12 + (n2 – 1)*s22
n1+n2 – 2
 Note above – method of calculating p value changes depending on where your t value lies.
 Variance of phat = pq/n; SE(phat) = sqrt(pq/n)
 Degrees of freedom = n1 + n2 – 2

 If 0, which Δµ should equal, is within your confidence interval, no reason to dispute your
hypothesis
 ALWAYS START WITH what is unknown? What do you need to make an inference about?
 Kind of silly note: the lower your alpha (significance level in hypothesis testing, level of type I
error one is willing to make), the bigger your sample size needs to be to have a p value below
your alpha
 Alpha in terms of CI’s means 95% of confidence intervals should include the true value

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 Looking at different distributions:
o Discrete:
 B – n, p
 P – λ, µ
o Continuous:
 Z – (x-µ)/σ, X~N(µ, σ2)
 T – df
 Χ2 – df
 F – 2 different df’s (one for each sample)

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 Looking at the back of the textbook, across the top is numerator, down the side is denominator
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 Think
o What is your hypothesis?
o What are you testing (i.e. what test statistic are you using?)
o Ok, calculating test statistic and/or p value (tbh, they’re basically the same, one is the
probability of the other)
 Note: the null hypothesis ALWAYS is the one that says there is no difference – not the one
against your own hypothesis
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 Df assuming variances are the same = n1+n2-2
 Now it’s that complex box thing. The double prime comes from rounding d’ down to the nearest
integer
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 Other side of the coin – CI’s for 2 sample w/ unequal variances

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 If 0 is within the confidence interval (representing no difference) you have no reason to reject
the null

CH 10: Hypothesis Testing – Categorical Data

 There is a lecture missing – fill it in, Ice.
 Zcorr is not correlation, but continuity correction, Ice (that part that looks like 1/2n) – helps to
correct for when x is really tiny.
o Also called finite population correction (fPC)
 Three steps to hypothesis testing: 1) state your null and alternative hypotheses, 2) run it
through your calculation to get a z/t/f/etc value, 3) calculate your critical value or p value to
decide to reject null or not to
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