Question

A study was conducted to find out if a new exercise program was more effective than an old one at improving cardiovascular fitness. Subjects were randomly selected to participate and then randomly assigned to one of the two programs. After six months of exercising, they were given a score based on their fitness performance. Scores ranged from 19 to 73, with higher scores indicating higher performance. Which of the following hypothesis tests would be best for this study?
A) Paired data test
B) Independent sample test
C) ANOVA
D) Test of two proportions
E) Chi-squared test of independence
F) Hypothesis test for regression

Answer 1

Answer: (B)

Step-by-step explanation:

An independent sample test compares two sample means in order to determine the statistical significance of the difference between their population means.

The independent sample test would be the best hypothesis test for this study because:

1. There was a random samples of data from the population

2. There was no relationship between the subjects in each sample. That is;

- subjects in the first group were not also in the second group

- subjects in the first group did not influence subjects in the second group and vice versa.

3. There was independence of observations in this study. Each subject in each group was separately observed and each subject has a given fitness performance score.

4. There are values on both the dependent and independent variables.

- the dependent variable is FITNESS PERFORMANCE and for each subject, it is dependent on either the OLD EXERCISE PROGRAM or the NEW EXERCISE PROGRAM.

5. Our dependent variable her is a continuous variable as we see from the range of fitness scores. The lowest score is 19 and the highest score is 73. This shows that the variable is continuous. All the other scores fall in between.

6. Our independent variable is a categorical variable. Categorized into OLD EXERCISE PROGRAM and NEW EXERCISE PROGRAM.