In: Statistics and Probability
A criminologist is interested in possible disparities in the length of prison sentences between males and females convicted in murder-for-hire cases. Selecting 14 cases involving men convicted of trying to solicit someone to kill their wives and 16 cases involving women convicted of women trying to solicit someone to kill their husbands, the criminologist finds the following:
For males, the mean length of the prison sentences is M = 7.34 with SS = 82 For females, the mean length of the prison sentences is M = 9.19 with SS = 214
1. What is the null hypothesis here?
2. What is the alternative hypothesis here?
3. Should a one- or two-tailed test be done here? In answering, say what it is about the description of the research that leads you to your answer.
4. How many df are there for the male sample? How many df are there for the female sample? How many total df are there? And what is the critical value for t, assuming that alpha = .05?
5. What is the variance (s2) for the males? What is the variance (s2) for the females?
6. Compute pooled variance for these groups.
7. Compute the standard error of the difference (s(M1 – M2)).
8. Compute the observed value for t. And what is your decision about H0?
9. If you reject the null hypothesis, compute Cohen's d.
10. Write a conclusion that includes descriptive statistics, group labels, the dependent variable, inferential statistics, and the effect-size measure.