Question

Some smells are perceived as being more feminine or more masculine. Researchers asked a random sample of 300 American adults to score quantitatively the perceived gender-orientation of lavender. Smaller scores indicate a more feminine scent and larger scores a more masculine scent. In this design, a gender-neutral scent would have a perceived gender-orientation score of 12. The participants gave the scent of lavender an average score of 10.28
a. Is this evidence that the scent of lavender is not gender-neutral, on average? State H0cap h sub zero and Hacap h sub a in the corresponding test, indicating what the parameter in your hypotheses is.

b.The researchers report that "p<.01p less than full stop 01 (2-tail)" for this test. Explain the meaning of "p<.01p less than full stop 01" and "2-tail."

c.Assuming that the conditions for inference were met, conclude in the context of this study.

Answer 1

Answer:

a) We are told smaller scores indicate a more feminine scent and larger scores a more masculine scent, also a score of 12 represents a gender-neutral scent.

Here the average from the sample for lavender is 10.28

To test for the evidence that lavender is not gender neutral on average, the null hypothesis H0 would take that lavender is gender-neutral, while the alternative hypothesis would take that the score of lavender is not gender neutral. We now have the null and alternative hypotheses as:

H0 : u = 12

H1 : u ≠ 12

Here, u represents the mean gender-orientation score for lavender. The alternative is two sided because we want to test if lavender is not gender neutral. Which means lavender might be more masculine of more feminine.

b) Given: p < 0.01 (2 tailed)

This means the p-value is less than level of significance 0.01.

Since the pvalue is less than the level of significance, we reject null hypothesis H0. This means there is sufficient evidence to conclude that the smell is not gender-neutral.

There is no reason to prefer a particular gender, that's why this is a two tailed hypothesis.

c) c.Assuming that the conditions for inference were met, which means the p-value is less than 0.01 so the null hypothesis H0 is rejected.

The conlusion would be that there is enough evidence to conclude that lavender is not gender-neutral