Answer to Question #203714 in Economics for alex

Question

1.       Nielsen reported that young men in the United States watch 56.2 minutes of prime-time TV daily (The Wall Street Journal Europe, November 18, 2003). A researcher believes that young men in Germany spend more time watching prime-time TV. A sample of German young men will be selected by the researcher and the time they spend watching TV in one day will be recorded. The sample results will be used to test the following null and alternative hypotheses.

A.    What is the Type I error in this situation? What are the consequences of making this error?

B.      What is the Type II error in this situation? What are the consequences of making this error?

Answer 1

When testing statistical hypotheses, errors (erroneous judgments) of two types are possible:

- it is possible to reject the null hypothesis when it is actually correct (the so-called error of the first kind), in this case it is a refutation of the fact that in Germany young people spend more time watching TV, thus we will get the wrong results of the experiment.

- you can accept the null hypothesis when it is actually not true (the so-called type II error). If we accept the null hypothesis and determine that young people in Germany watch TV for a shorter time, then on the basis of this data a false conclusion can be made about the plausibility of the phenomenon under study.