Question: The newspaper Stupid Times published a study on the connection between the number of books people have read (x) and the serious colds they have
The newspaper Stupid Times published a study on the connection between the number of books people have read (x) and the serious colds they have had. The study—which relied on a mere five observations—produced the following data:
The standard deviation of books read is 432.9; the standard deviation of serious colds is 7.5.
(a) Calculate Pearson’s correlation coefficient. What conclusion is Stupid Times likely to have drawn?
(b) Explain what a spurious correlation is theoretically.
(c) Based on your understanding of a spurious correlation, how do you interpret the result in (a)?
Observation (x-x)(y-y) 1 203.4 2 847.4 3 9329.4 4 4703.4 5 -225.6
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a Using the table we can calculate the following Pearsons correlati... View full answer
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