Reference no: EM132474259

Systolic hypertension occurs when a person's systolic blood pressure measurement is elevated. It is important for patients suffering from systolic hypertension to reduce their blood pressure below 140 mmHg, and medication can be used to help achieve this goal. Researchers want to see if a new medication has a statistically significant effect of reducing systolic blood pressure below 140 mmHg. In a pilot study, they collect a random sample of 20 men experiencing systolic hypertension, administer the new medication, then measure the average blood pressure of men after treatment. The average systolic blood pressure reading for men after treatment was 122.9 mmHg with a standard deviation of 15.9 mmHg.

a) Without computation, does a brief analysis of the data seem to suggest that this medication is effective at reducing blood pressure below 140 mmHg? Why or why not.

b) Write the null and alternative hypotheses for this test using statistical notation.

c) One researcher tries to compute the test statistic and enters the following into a calculator:

122.9 - 140 / (15.9/sqrt(20)) = 83.522702283023

Explain why the final answer is implausible and what the researcher may have done wrong.

d) Statistical software allows the researchers to correctly compute the p-value to be 0.0001. Based on this p-value, does it appear that this new medication is effective at reducing blood pressure below 140 mmHg? Explain using a significance level of 0.05.