ST3241 Categorical Data Analysis I

Semester II, 2012-2013

Tutorial 2
1. The following table was taken from the 1991 General Social Survey.

Belief in Afterlife
Race Yes No or Undecided
White 621 239
Black 89 42

(a) Identify each classification as a response or explanatory variable.

(b) Describe the association. Interpret the direction and strength of association.
(c) Obtain a 95% confidence interval for a population measure of association, and interpret.

2. In an article about crime in the United States,Newsweek magazine (Jan. 10, 1994) quoted
FBI statistics stating that of all blacks slain in 1992, 94% were slain by blacks, and of all
whites slain in 1992, 83% were slain by whites. Let Y denote the race of victim and X
denote race of murderer.
(a) Which conditional distribution do these statistics refer to, Y given X, or X given Y ?
(b) Calculate and interpret the odds ratio between X and Y .
(c) Given that a murderer was white, can you estimate the probability that the victim was
white? What additional information would you need to do this?

3. In a survey conducted in Italy, physicians with different specialties were questioned re-
garding the surgical treatment of early breast cancer. In particular, they were asked
whether they would recommend radical surgery regardless of a patients age (R), conserva-
tive surgery only for younger patients (CR), or conservative surgery regardless of age (C).
The results of this survey are presented below:

Physician Surgery
Specialty R CR C Total
Internal 6 22 42 70
Surgery 23 61 127 211
Radiotherapy 2 3 54 59
Oncology 1 12 43 56
Gynecology 1 12 31 44
Total 33 110 297 440

(a) At the 0.05 level of significance, test the null hypothesis that there is no association
between physician specialty and recommended treatment.
(b) What do you conclude?

1
4. A study on educational aspirations of high school students (S. Crysdale, Int. J. Com-
par. Sociol., 16:19 - 36(1975)) measured aspirations using the scale (some high school,
high school graduate, some college, college graduate). For students whose family income
was low, the counts in these categories were (9, 44, 13, 10); when the family income was
middle, the counts were (11, 52, 23, 22); when family income was high, the counts were
(9, 41, 12, 27).

(a) Test independence of educational aspirations and family income using Pearsons χ2
(chi-square) test or likelihood ratio test. Interpret, and explain the deficiency of this test
for these data.
(b) Calculate the adjusted residuals. Do they suggest any association pattern?
(c) Conduct an alternative test that may be more powerful. Interpret results.

5. The following data consist of a random sample of 793 individuals who were involved in
bicycle accidents during a specified one-year period.

Wearing Helmet
Head Injury Yes No Total
Yes 17 218 235
No 130 428 558
Total 147 646 793

(a) Construct a 90% confidence interval for the difference of proportions, and interpret.
(b) Construct a 90% confidence interval for odds ratio, and interpret.
(c) Conduct a test of statistical independence. Interpret.