Assignment 4 Applied Statistics

See attachment for instructions.

Use this document as a guide of what is expected of you when writing your statistical report

A statistical report contains many elements that are common to any formal report. At the very minimum, the report must the following among others:

· Be in proper APA format (in text citations, figures, tables)

· Be written in the third person

· Contain correct grammar and punctuation

· Have proper formatting for references

· Generally contain an introduction, body literature review, methodology, findings, conclusion, references, and appendices.

In addition, a formal statistical report that outlines a study or experiment will have the following parts.

· Abstract
This is limited to one paragraph of about 25 words and is a summary of the most important parts of the paper. A person reading this summary should be able to determine if this is a paper that is relevant to what they are studying or not.

· Introduction
The introduction is a brief statement of the problem or issue that the study is investigating. It should indicate why this is an important problem. Other subtopics that you may include in your introduction are:

· Background of the Study – what is happening to prompt the study?

· Statement of the Problem – what problem are you trying to solve.

· Significance of the Study/Project – a discussion of the importance of the study/project with supporting evidence

· Research Questions you are trying to answer

· Theoretical Framework – what is the organizing or guiding principle(s) for the study

· Definition of Terms – define all the terms, including variables in the study to assure common understanding

· Limitations of the Study – what are some of the limitations of your study (note that there is no perfect study. Every study has underlying limitations). We highlight these limitations to allow for proper interpretation of results and recommendations in the context of such limitations.

· Organization of the Study – a description of the organization of the study to aid readers have a complete picture of what to expect.

· Literature Review

This is a section where you discuss and summarize previous studies that have been conducted on the topic or variables of interest. These are often studies that investigate issues related to your topic of interest.

· Methodology
This section delineates the process that the researcher went through. It should include how the units for the subjects were selected (sampling method), how the data was collected, what procedures (tests) were used to analyze the data. If hypotheses tests are used this section would contain the original statement of the hypotheses, requirements check. For a confidence interval, this would specify the parameter being estimated and the requirements. In summary, this section may include all or some of the following and other related items:

· Research Design

· Population of Study

· Sampling Plan

· Power and Sample Size Determination

· Measurement and Instrumentation

· Validity and Reliability Issues

· Data Collection Procedures

· Data Analysis Procedures

· Results/Findings
This is a statement of the results of the tests. If hypothesis tests are run it would include the hypotheses, test statistics, p-values, and decision for each. It describes how the results can be interpreted. If confidence intervals are included it contains the point estimates and error terms as well as the intervals and an interpretation of the interval. It may contain tables or graphical displays illustrating the results. As always, all graphs and tables must have titles, all scales labeled, and must be accompanied by an explanation, even if the explanation is quite obvious.

· Discussion and Recommendations
This is a discussion of the difficulties encountered, an interpretation of the results, implications of the results, how the results can be used, and an explanation of why these are important results.
It also contains suggestions for future studies on the topic or related topic.

·

Conclusion
This is a quick summary of the most important findings in the study.

· Bibliography and/or References

· Appendices
The appendix should contain any raw data that was used or technical supplements.

Some notes:

· This outline is provided as a guide highlighting what is expected of you as you work on assignments. Note that not all the sections may apply to all assignments. Exercise your judgement and only include relevant sections applicable to the assignment you are working on. In other words, omit the sections that do not apply as you complete your assignments.

· Any graphs or figures used should be labeled (usually with consecutive numbers-Graph 1, Graph 2,…, Figure 1, Figure 2,…, Table 1, Table 2,…) and captioned, for example,

Graph 1: Histogram distribution of body weight

The graphs or figures should be included in the body of the paper (and not in appendices). When referring to these figures, you should refer to “Graph 1” rather than “the histogram on page 3”.

Finalize Course Project and Prepare to Defend

Scenario 1: A provost of a local university is interested in finding out whether satisfaction differs among doctoral students in the Doctoral of Business Administration (DBA) and Instructional Design Leadership (IDL) programs has consulted your classmate to conduct a research. After doing the research, your classmate determines that there is a statistically significant difference (p= .02) between the DBA students (M=80, SD= 7) and the IDL students (M=82, SD= 7).

1. Based on the scenario 1 above, address the following

a. State a possible research problem and put it in a form of a question

b. Describe the type of data your classmate has probably collected for this study

c. Describe possible variable(s)

d. What were statistical hypotheses

e. Describe the type of data your classmate collected

f. Describe the statistical method(s) that your classmate probably used to analyze data

g. Discuss what these results mean

Scenario 2: Describe a potential study or an actual study where at least 2 groups will be compared on some selected dependent variable (for example, one can undertake a study comparing SAT scores of undergraduate student athletic and non-athletic to determine the success of this student in college measured by their GPA scores). This could be a study related to your field of career, interest, or research. Provide some background of the problem you want to address in the study. Describe the groups to be compared and identify on what parameter(s) you would like to compare them.

1. Identify target population and describe how you would draw a random sample.

8. Why is sample size important?

8. What are some of the issues that must be taken into account when choosing a sample size?

1. Find or create a data set with at least 40 data observations to be used in this study.

1. Describe the variable(s) to be measured.

1. Discuss the statistical method(s) you would use in this study and their assumptions.

1. Generate graph(s) to help you analyze the data.

1. Conduct the statistical analysis using SPSS and interpret the output.

1. Write a statistical report summarizing your study and analyses including any graphs and statistical outputs. Use the following 

outline

(attached) as a guide. Be sure to include your interpretation of the analysis, how they address the problem at hand, what implications this would have for some other areas and what recommendations you would provide.