When we look at the variables in Mireault’s data, we will want to be sure that there are not systematic differences of which we are ignorant. For example, if we found that the gender of the parent who died was an important variable in explaining some outcome variable, we would not like to later discover that the gender of the parent who died was in some way related to the gender of the subject, and that the effects of the two variables were confounded.

a. Run a chi-square test on these two variables.

b. Interpret the results.

c. What would it mean to our interpretation of the relationship between gender of the parent and some other variable (e.g., subject’s level of depression) if the gender of the parent is itself related to the gender of the subject?